


The Time Travelling Wife

by JLPierre



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst and Fluff and Smut, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Fluff and Smut, Grief/Mourning, Smut, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-08
Updated: 2017-07-05
Packaged: 2018-10-01 05:09:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 14
Words: 32,800
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10181375
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JLPierre/pseuds/JLPierre
Summary: Warning: AU! - - When Hermione is floored by grief and unable to think straight, she goes to extreme lengths to be with the person she loves. Travelling to a time when things were far less complicated and with an undeniable passion she could never ignore, will she remain level headed or will she lose herself in a time that is not her own? Rated M for language and sexual content.Runner Up of "Time Lord Award", Best Time-Travel Fic - Sirimione Category, in the Granger Enchanted Summer 2017 Awards.Voted 2nd Best Time Travel Fic & Best Underappreciated Fic in the Mischief Managed Awards 2017.





	1. Time

****

**AN:**  Welcome, Welcome!  
I have been sat on this plunny for quite some time and I am so excited to finally begin posting it. As usual, by Pierre standards, I do not know how long this piece will be. I have it mapped out but I tend to go off in the middle and may or may not take up more chapters than I mean too. I hope you enjoy this piece, it is loosely based on the film/book of a similar film.

This will be AU, without giving too much away I have adapted the story that we know and love from both books to make this something I am happy with. I hope you enjoy it all the same.

 **Warnings:**  It's Hella' Emotional. Mentions of deaths, mourning.  
**Updates** : Weekly - on a Wednesday, I hope!  
**Beta/Alpha/Just all the Love** : A massive, huge thank you goes to SlytherinPrincessNurse1992, without you this would have remained something locked in my google doc's. You've helped with my confidence and making this piece flourish. Thank you.

* * *

**The Time-Travelling Wife**

* * *

**Chapter One**

* * *

_Can someone tell me who I am?_  
_I haven't recognised myself in a while_  
_And since you left, I stay up every night_  
_Thinking if you were here, you put me right_

\- **Birdy,** Ghost In The Wind

* * *

**April 2005**

Hermione lay in the sheets, her eyes burning with painful tears that never seemed to let up. She didn't recognise the woman that met her gaze in the mirror anymore. Gone were the wide amber eyes that once held so much compassion in them and the flicks of gold disappearing just as he had. The figure she had fought for was fading and thinning just like her happiness was, it was all lost and was all being taken with her willpower to continue withering. She didn't hear her thoughts anymore and she was sure her brain had broken beyond repair, so wrapped up in grief that it had shut down and surrounded her in silence that she should find comforting, but it wasn't and she didn't

It had all gone with him. It had been sucked from her spirit when she said goodbye, even though she didn't want to. Gone and never able to return. Her body alone in bed that they had once shared and a room that usually held the laughter in it. His t-shirt still slung over the chair from that morning, his scent still embedded into the fabric. Just like their bed.

Her hand stretched out to his side of the sheets, the horrid feel of coldness greeting her as she closed her eyes before smoothing her hand over the cotton. She remembered his words that morning, the promises and the ridiculous jokes that he had said. She remembered him stroking his beard, commenting that he would trim it later and that he would take her for a picnic tomorrow when they had time to themselves.

It seemed that death was the only one who could joke. It had come back for him just when she had thought she was safe, wondering if when she had meddled with the inevitable and pain was always a destination she would arrive at.

Hermione just wanted more time; she  _needed_  more time. She needed to touch his skin once more, remember the arch of his cheeks and the feel of his beard against her cheek and fingers. She needed to hear his laugh, watch his smile grow and feel the love he had for her.

_She needed more time._

Her eyes suddenly widening at the realisation, a tingling in her fingers and toes as a smile began to crack over her dry lips. Her head was rising from the pillow as her curls stuck to the side of her face. "More time," she whispered to the room, and she was sure the wind howling against the window was him talking to her, convincing her to follow through with her thoughts. Not that she ever needed any convincing, he had brought the devious part of her out so many years before.

She pulled the rest of her body up, sitting in the mess of sheets she had lived in for a week. "I'm coming, whether you like it or  _not_."

The wind howled, the tree branches bashing against the window as she couldn't help the smile that crept over her lips. Her eyes caught the frame she had placed down on the bedside table, lifting it with an unsteady hand as his smile greeted her as he carried her in his arms. His raven locks shaping his handsome face, the face she just needed to see once more.

* * *

**Summer 1979**

He didn't look alarmed when she knocked on his door. He looked like he recognised her; he looked like he knew exactly who she was even though she knew that couldn't be true, not unless...

"Hermione?" He breathed, not even realising that hers had been caught in her throat until she let flow out from between her teeth.

The sound of her name on his lips was something she wanted to commit to memory, to hold onto and cherish, the beauty of knowing she would hear it another day - gone, like so many things she had taken for granted.  _He must still be able to recognise me,_ she thought to herself.

She fought all of her instincts that wanted her to throw herself into his arms. Instead, she just let out every held emotion and poured it into a single word. "Sirius?"

He knew her; he looked at her like she was an old friend that he hadn't expected to see. She swallowed the words that wanted to spew out and she pushed back the doubts in her mind, slowly spreading a smile over her face. He looked just like she remembered and she was happy to find that her memories were correct and her counterpart wasn't around. She was happy that he was stood here, just like she remembered.

"You... you know who I am?" Hermione asked, it dawning on her that she had aged considerably compared to the woman who had been busying herself around their flat earlier. Her hand was spreading out the creases on an old dress that hung limply from her bones as she took in the sight of him, hoping that she didn't disappoint.

Sirius's lips slowly rose to a smirk, a smirk that she remembered hating and loving all in the same breath. It was a devious, mysterious grin that even in all their years she had never figured out what he meant when he used it. "I'd be a  _shoddy_  boyfriend if I didn't," he chuckled.

Hermione closed her open mouth, compressing her lips together just so she didn't shout that they were far more than that. They were married, they had a baby and they were out of the war. She didn't want to spill their secrets, she didn't want to alter their time and she didn't want to change anything here either, she just wanted a moment with him. One, innocent and beautiful moment that might bring her peace.

Sirius cleared his throat, running his fingers through his long hair and moving it out of his face. "Although, this is our first meeting with you this age," his eyebrow cocking up as he stepped out of the way of the door, inviting her into her former home and without a single thought she slowly stepped in, basking in the familiar smell of happiness not even beginning to question what he had meant.

* * *

**xox**


	2. Travelling

**Beta/Alpha/Just all the Love:** A massive, huge thank you goes to **SlytherinPrincessNurse1992** for just being an utter babe.

* * *

  **Chapter Two**

* * *

_Can we pretend,_

_That everything is like yesterday?_

\- **Tinashe,** Pretend

* * *

**January 1977**

"I am in love with you," her mouth remaining parted, unsure if it had happened or if her mind had made it up. "I am, so in love with you that I want you to be happy and for a while, I thought being me, the old me. Would not allow you to be that."

"Sirius..."

"No," he said silencing her as he moved closer to her, "you are right. You are always right and what you don't get is that I do believe, in both you and us. But I'm also scared and fear is what is stopping me from coming over there and kissing you because you're my best friend."

"I can still be your best friend?" Hermione whispered. "But for me, it's always been you, Sirius. I've just held out and waited because timing is a bitch and I just thought, one day, that you'd kiss me and it would mean more than —

"You want me to kiss you?"

Her shoulders sagged as she smiled before sighing, "like your entire life depends on it."

He crossed the room in two strides and held the sides of her face as he did just that, stealing her breath away as his lips coated hers in him. She got so lost in the moment she barely realised he had raised her from the ground, the weightlessness adding to the beauty of his kiss. It was electricity and heart stopping and she was sure the world moved on its axis, but it was when their lips broke that she felt something more. His eyes fixed on her as she lowered to the ground, the two of them breathing each other's air.

"I'm not scared anymore," he whispered. "I want it all with you. I can't be or have anything without you; I know that now."

"I'm glad you caught up," Hermione replied, her hand weaving around his neck, as he smiled into the skin of her arm, kissing it. "You're it for me too, Sirius. All of you. Your past, present and whatever will be in our future."

"You were never a notch."

"You were always an idiot," his snigger making her laugh as she licked her lips.

"Be mine."

"I've always been yours... I told you that," Hermione whispered as she slowly began to undo his tie. "But I want you, all of you… right now."

* * *

 

**April 2005  
** _Two Weeks Before Time-Turner_

Her hand rattled against the table, her body numb and the cogs in her brain stuck. She could hear her child screaming but she couldn't get her legs to stand and take herself to him. Her eyes met Harry's who didn't need to be verbally told anything and he just headed out of the room, her dry eyes moving to find the others who looked at her with a mixture of fear and concern present in their eyes.

"This is my fault..."

It was the only words that were forming in her head and somehow she knew she had to let them out, either that or let them consume her. She had told him that she'd save him because their love was everything, they were everything. Thirteen years that was taken from them and now, even more, had been robbed from them.

"Hermione," Remus sighed as he sunk in the chair beside her, taking his best friends hands as she looked at him blankly. "You can't put this on you."

"I can," she whispered with confidence. "Sirius went to that shop for me, not for anyone else. He left his wand behind because I had been teasing him and he got shot because I wasn't there to protect him." Her head dipping as the irony washed over her, the tension in the room heightening at the sound of her soft laughs and shaking body.

"Hermione?"

She licked her lips as she met his worried gaze, "it's ironic, isn't it? He loved me because he knew I'd annoy his mother the most. He threw himself into the muggle world because it would really irk her and it was the muggle world that took him, it was a muggle object that stole him from me. My world killed him; he always thought it would be his," she smirked again as she thought about the countless times he had given a speech on him not being good enough for her. "Irony at its finest, wouldn't you say?"

The room went silent, but she didn't need anyone to say anything, the silence was enough of an answer for her.

* * *

**Summer 1979**

The gasp that came from her mouth as she saw the old orange sofa, the ridiculous curtains that she had once thought were beautiful and the vase that now stood on his bedside table in her home in her time. It seemed like another life ago, but then, it had been. They had their crazy years at Hogwarts and then they had their years of living through a war and losing everyone one by one. She shuddered when she thought of the years where she had left him before smiling at their reunion, the years of struggles before she saved him from his cousin. She turned to face this Sirius, this youthful and unknowing Sirius.

She turned to face this Sirius, this young and unknowing Sirius. He looked so happy, smile lines still showing as he stared at her the same way he had done that morning, their last morning. Hermione reached up to touch him hesitantly, her hand cupping his soft cheek and he turned to kiss her palm, tears springing to her eyes as she tried to compose herself, the stinging making it all feel so real.

"So... you travelled again —"

"— Time travelled," Hermione corrected as he rubbed his temple. "Sorry... continue."

His steel eyes washed over her, unsure if they were mad at her or just confused. Sirius turned from her as his hand was running through his dark hair as he pushed it away from his face, his nostrils flaring before his features suddenly relaxed. Not knowing what to do, she moved over to the sofa and sunk into the soft material remembering the feel of it perfectly.

"Still an insufferable know it all then?" He commented as he turned back to face her before he sighed and she saw the struggle on his face.

Hermione wanted to laugh, not being able to take her eyes from him as a million questions hammered her mind. "Do I... Do I look different?"

His eyes warmed as he glanced over her features, moving over and kneeling before her as he placed his hand on her knee. "If you mean do you look more beautiful? Then yes. Hermione... I can feel that you're hurting and if that is why you're here, at this age I..." Sirius dipped his head, the words catching on his tongue. "I can't fix whatever I do in the future; you know that this is all... preset?"

"I know," she softly released a breath as he brushed her hair behind her ear. "I'm sorry..." He looked downcast at her apology as if that was the last thing he wanted from her. "I, miss you like this." I miss you in general, she wanted to say but stopped.

Hermione felt his fingers against her cheek, moving down to her chin as he brought her eyes to face his and the gesture brought fresh tears to her eyes. The million or so questions simmering to just one painful one instead, why did the world have to take the thing I love the most? Why didn't you come home?

"It's okay love," Sirius said unknowing of the pain in her chest.

"— No," her hand rising to cup her chin, fear suddenly coursing through her now that she was here. Her brain whirling with the consequences of her actions and she hated it, she hated that he made her reckless. "No, no... this, this is why you shouldn't mess with time, we can't, I can't alter —"

"— Hermione," Sirius breathed as he held onto her shoulders, forcing the parts of her that were falling away from her, back together and making her whole as he slid beside her on the sofa. "I think when you fell upon me at Christmas you altered the time. As I said, this is not the first time you've come here."

"But this, this is different Sirius —"

His fingers were spreading out to massage her bones, "then let's just..." his voice trailed off as he tilted his head, her eyes watching him expectantly. She watched as a small smile began to grow on his lips before filling his cheeks with happiness. "Be? You are here, until you go there is nothing that can change or will change."

She missed the smell of him, even the horrid cigarettes and Jack Daniel's, an obsession she helped him make. Hermione missed the way he looked at her as if she was everything and more. She wanted it to be enough to pacify her and happily return to the present and not undo anything like she was possibly doing. She would take just being able to touch him, speak with him, hear him and be near him over not having him at all. Which made it all the more heartbreaking when he began talking again, taking all of her strength to not fall apart with his words.

"Why can't you just stay?"

She opened her mouth to respond with the logical answer, _the most important answer_ of time continuation and that it had been an accident in the first place. But more who she had become stopped her, more than even her beating heart prevented her from treating this like she was answering a professor.

Instead, her hand lifted to his cheek as she cupped it softly. "If I could, I would," was what she replied as he moved to kiss her palm. "If a younger version of me weren't about to walk through that door, I'd stay forever." I'd stay and appreciate you more, she thought.

He sighed before looking at her intently. She hoped that he couldn't see into her mind because she feared if he knew too much, he'd never let her leave.

"The Time-Turner I have," her eyes looking down at the bag it was contained in. "It's not mine. It's... borrowed."

"Hermione?" Sirius said warningly; a detest of his that she seemed to always put herself in danger. "What do you mean?"

She licked her lips as she took a breath, hoping it would give her confidence and hating that it didn't. "You need to remember that this is a self-fulfilling, I was always going to come back here and —"

"— Hermione!" He said sharply.

"I had to take it," tears filling her eyes. "I can't explain my reasons because, well I can't but, I was always going to come back. I was always going to take this and use it. You were always going to meet me at this age, then, because of the loop —" she watched as Sirius began to rub his temple and she hoped it wasn't in annoyance. She didn't do all of this for him to spend moments with him being mad at her. "— I needed to come here and see you. It's my destiny if you will."

Sirius looked as though he already knew the rest, after all, he was far more intelligent than people gave him credit for. But it was the sadness in his eyes that hurt her the most.

"You must have said this is the first time I visited you at this age," she mumbled, "so you know that I've thought this through. You know that —"

His hand cupped her cheek, his thumb rubbing across her lips as he stared into her eyes, "I know."

Hermione wanted to part her lips, whisper for him never to break eye contact with her again. She wanted to shout at him to love her and to shake her when he gets older and tell her who she is to him.

She wanted to spill it all to him.

That he left her. That she would save him from near falling into the veil and that she would save him from the Death Eaters and she would save him plenty of other times because he was careless and he needed to think. He needed to take a second and bloody think! She wanted to grasp his shoulders and stare boldly into his grey eyes and make him promise, make him swear that he would be more careful and it would then re-write their history. She wanted to sob; she wanted to insist that he listen because she couldn't protect him from the world. She couldn't stop them from hurting him, and that their time was running out and she needed him to know, she needed him to love her for longer.

She just needed him, she wanted him to understand that. She couldn't find the words, though, she knew that she couldn't say or do anything because time was a fickle thing.

Hermione hated how delicate time was; she despised more than she despised her lack of self-control and her displeasure at being so weak that she couldn't cope. She just hated it all.

Every fibre of everything and she wanted him; she needed him back. Nothing made sense without him.

"Do we have a while, years and years?" His tone filled with sadness, the air bending around them as if it was in mourning itself.

Hermione tried to breathe, because if she didn't focus on something she was sure she'd explode into a volcano of tears, drowning him and anyone who came to investigate. She was sure that she'd fall apart and the invisible string that was currently holding her together, would break apart and leave her a quivering mess.

"Yes..." was all she managed to stutter out and he bowed his head, probably because he knew she was lying she knew she was never very good at it.

Even if Hermione could, even if she was permitted she couldn't tell him no, she wouldn't be able to say that they were on borrowed time, that she had screwed up and had made him suffer. She had been the one who selfishly in saving him, giving him the chance of a life with her only for it to be taken away so cruelly.

Hermione couldn't say that in theory, she had been the one to take their time away.

They didn't get years; they got a good few that was it. If Hermione could tell Sirius and warn him about Halloween, they could salvage some more and maybe it wouldn't hurt as much as it did. It wouldn't feel like the weight of the world was pressing down on her, it wouldn't break her when she looked into their child's eyes and saw silver like there was in his. Maybe she wouldn't cry every night; maybe she'd sleep and maybe she'd be able to smile.

"We are so, so, happy. I promise, Sirius," Hermione lied, masking her pain and ignoring the burning of the tears that wished to spill.

* * *

 

**xox**


	3. Kiss Through Time

**AN:** I was not expecting to have this kind of reaction at all, it makes me so happy reading your reviews and seeing how many of you are following/favouriting something that means so much to me.

 **Beta/Alpha/Just all the Love** : A massive, huge thank you goes to _SlytherinPrincessNurse1992_  for just being an utter babe.

* * *

**Chapter Three**

* * *

And I'd give up forever to touch you  
'Cause I know that you feel me somehow  
You're the closest to heaven that I'll ever be  
And I don't want to go home right now

 _-_ **The Goo Goo Dolls** , Iris

* * *

**Spring 2000**

Hermione was not like most girls; she didn't care much for her how she looked to others, she didn't dream of a life with marriage and children. Hermione had only ever wanted two things in her life, happiness and books. It wasn't until she woke in the arms of Sirius Black that she added a third, decided at that moment she never wanted to be without him either.

She hadn't known then that it would be so hard to keep him and she felt she had spent most of her years with him, fighting others over him or for him. None of which she regretted.

It had led her to this moment, after all, the moment she felt she had waited a billion lifetimes for and in true Sirius fashion, he was late. There were several things that irked Hermione, most of them revolving around her protection of her friends but time keeping was also one at the top. None of this was helped by the fact she was stood in white, waiting in a small church that she didn't even want to be stood in with several of their friends waiting.

Others may have had doubts flooding them, embarrassment beginning to show on their perfectly presented faces. Not Hermione, she only felt anger at her tardy wizard because deep down she knew that the two of them were made for another, two halves of the same coin, two souls destined to find one another even if they spent lifetimes trying to get here. She didn't want to give up and leave the church, friends and family in tow because he had stood her up, she wanted to make them all leave, so she didn't have to hex him in front of muggles and get the Ministry involved.

Just as her mind had begun conjuring curses she could use on him without visible marks, the oak doors opened, and he came through them.

Her breath was immediately stolen. All the anger that had been brewing like a cauldron explosion ready to happen, simmered. He wasn't like the wizard she had seen that morning with his shaggy hair and unmatching muggle suit. His beard - while still long, was cleanly styled - and his hair trimmed in a medium length style that had been combed back. His suit was something else and looked like it had been ripped off a catwalk from one of her magazines. If it was ever possible, Sirius Black was more handsome than she had ever known and she was sure she had fallen in love with him all over again. So much so, her words were caught when he stood by her side, his lips pressed to her cheek.

"Sorry love," he whispered with a grin. "This dog was learning new tricks."

"Forgiven," she whispered back as they turned to the worried minister, his eyes looking from one to the other.

"Ready?"

Hermione turned her head to the man beside her, wanting to say and do so much. "Like my life depends on it."

Sirius chuckled, pulling her hand into his as he took her all in and she knew he was committing her to memory just as she was. "You ready to be with me till I am old and grey?"

Hermione tried to stifle her laugh, remembering his words earlier that week that he would never be grey because he was a Black. "I thought you couldn't go grey?"

"I didn't think I'd ever get married," Sirius jested as she smiled. "I'm a talented dog learning all these new tricks, don'tcha think?"

"That I do."

Sirius tilted his head away from the minister, who she was sure was desperate to start, "save those words till he's said his bit. God," he joked sarcastically. "There was me thinking that you'd know the ins and outs of weddings, didn't think I'd need to school the brainiest chick in our school year."

"I'm sure that was Lily," Hermione retorted as she turned him to face the minister.

"That must be why you're rubbish at this then," he muttered from the side of his mouth, and she couldn't help but smile, pinching him even through his suit and feeling him flinch, a victorious smile on her face as the minister began his speech to marry them.

* * *

**Summer 1979**

Sirius didn't look up, moving both of his hands, so they enveloped hers and gave her a squeeze, just like she always remembered. A doleful veil had coated them, wrapping around them and taking the happiness, which had been short-lived, away.

Hermione took the opportunity to memorise his skin against her; she found she did that more with this version of him than she ever did with her own. She wanted to feel every curve of him, every line and every scar. Her eyes wanted to remember each tattoo before they were masked with the ones from his imprisonment.

She saw the eyes of their child as she stared at him and she bit down on her lips from mentioning him. Hermione wanted to say that he needed to kerb his language now because he found it far harder when he was older, he would need to quit smoking a pack a day and cut down to at least half because prison would get to him more.

Hermione couldn't help, though. She couldn't give any of those warnings, and it hurt her more than losing him. It was what played on her mind at each mention that she came back, that each time she saw him a little bit younger, and it bothered her that she did this at least a few times and still never warned him. She wasn't sure how she had the strength, she was struggling now.

Hermione rolled her lips together, looking at the curves of his and tried to remember how they felt against hers. She knew she would never forget how they made her feel, nothing else quite compares to it but the feel of them on hers, that felt like it was slipping away.

Was that why I come back? Because more of him slips from me.

She knew it was a dark tunnel she was tumbling down, wondering if this was what Alice in Wonderland was loosely based on because she sure as hell felt as though she was falling through a land she didn't know or understand. She also knew she couldn't continue to tumble; she couldn't keep free falling for the rest of her life and surely, that she could prevent. She could stop herself from needing to come back, just by having more of him to remember, just taking a little from the moment now rather than repeatedly coming back for more conversations where he scolded her.

"Sirius," she muttered, and she heard him lift his head, not allowing her eyes to meet his as she tried to process what she wanted to ask. It sounded lucrative, but it made sense, it was possible, surely. "If I kissed you, here… it's not." His hand gripping hers a little tighter to convince her to continue. "It's not cheating, is it?"

Hermione made sure to meet his watchful eyes then, wanting to read his answer before hearing it. His eyes were like pools of silver, urging her to dive in and swim in them. The urge to kiss him only becoming stronger. It heightening with the way he looked at her, filled with pure adoration and lust, a look she had long forgotten he gave her in all of her mourning.

Sirius moved his hand from hers as he snaked it into her hair, her eyes closing as she turned her head into his touch.  _Never stop,_  she thought, allowing the tingles of his touch swim over her.

Then she felt it, his lips on hers. They were soft, careful and just like she remembered. Her lips were parting as she gasped at how wondrous it felt, a ball of fire emerging in her chest as she pushed herself into him, grasping at his lip with more passion as the two tumbled into the back of the sofa. His other hand trailing her thigh as her hand pressed on his chest, the other in his raven locks as she pulled his lips to hers, tasting the cigarettes that he had yet to give up and the coffee he always made poorly.

* * *

 **April 2005  
** _One week before Time-Turner_

Hermione stared at the gravestone for what felt like an hour, her hand resting on the stone as she felt the cold radiate through her fingers. She looked at each arch of the letters of his name, hating the fact that her surname was never changed to match his. That their marriage was official, but he had been adamant about her keeping her independence, she wished she had fought him on this; she wished she had just changed it and made her fully his.

Her other hand rolled the ring around her fingers, tears falling down her face to the ground.

"I miss you," she whispered. "I miss you so much..."

She scratched at the stone, hoping for shards of it to get stuck in her nails so she'd have a part of him to take back with her.

Hermione felt weak, drained, defeated even. She had never felt so vulnerable in all of her time, and she had seen so much, been through even more and yet it was only now that she felt the weight of that. She felt the crushing realisation that she was alone, that she was a single parent to a child that was her husband's double. It was hitting her that one day she'd have to explain to someone why she couldn't date them, not being able to simply say you aren't the one like she wished too. She didn't want to be cruel after all, but it was the truth. No one was like him. No one could ever be like him.

Her lip began to tremble, thick warm tears trailing down her cheek as she stared at his name until it blurred. "We had so many years together… I had so much planned." Hermione clenched her eyes shut as she let out an earth-shaking sob, one that flowed through the graveyard and hung in the air. "You were meant to hold me together, that was what you said, you would…" Her eyes were opening, half hoping that she would see him and floored with disappointment when she didn't. "You and me, we were meant to be it."

Her hand gripped tightly onto the stone, hoping that his hand would come through and hold her fingers like he always did. She even hoped that he would pull her through, the two of them at least together even if it was in a place she didn't know or understand. She just wanted him.

"We were meant to live our best years together," she whimpered, unsure how she was going to carry on, not even sure that she could stand up as she let out the sobs that had been building. "We were meant to live until we were grey." There was a poignant pause, the wind brushing over her as she smiled. "Yes, yes," she said between sobs, "you can't turn grey because you are a Black." Her tongue licking the tears from her lips as she gripped the gravestone a little tighter, almost hearing him telling her to let go.

Hermione wasn't sure she was able to, even considering moving here and building a home around where he lay. The wind brushed past her even colder this time; she half hoped it was him. "I can't let go; I'm not ready."

"Hermione?"

She looked over to see Remus stood with a thick coat that she knew had belonged to Sirius, one of her favourites. "I can't," she mumbled, begging him in her own way. Remus tilted his head visibly pained by her state as a large sigh came from him before he stepped closer and it put her on edge. "Please,  _please_  don't take me home," she begged clearly this time even through harsh tears, her whole face coated in her pain.

Hermione watched as Remus slowly lowered himself to the ground beside her, his hand reaching out to touch the other side of the stone. Her eyes were watching him tenderly.

"I'm not quite ready either," Remus admitted, and without letting go of Sirius, she placed her head on his shoulder and allowed some comfort from their friend.

* * *

**xox**


	4. Not The Last

**AN:**  a warning of LEMONS. It is all for the plot however and an important part of Hermione's journey. Thank you for all the lovely reviews and to the newbies, welcome and hello! I am so glad you've jumped aboard this train with me. This is also a day early, mainly because muggle life will intervene tomorrow and didn't want to keep you waiting. 

 **Beta/Alpha/Just all the Love** : A massive, huge thank you goes to _SlytherinPrincessNurse1992_  for being the best cheerleader I could ask for, she also pushes me to write more Sirius and more Remus; treats for you all.

* * *

**Chapter 4**

* * *

_It's been a long day, baby_  
_Things ain't been going my way_  
_And now I need you here  
_ _To clear my mind all the time_

 _\- -_ **Ray LaMontagne,** The Best Thing

* * *

**Summer 1979**

"I'm sorry," she whimpered, her hand still snaked into his hair, but her lips were barely touching his. "I…" Her eyes looking down flushed with embarrassment as she opened her mouth to apologise and explain, in the hope he'd understand but he took her lips before she had a chance. His mouth over hers, his body pressed against hers, moving between her legs as he filled her with something other than rage at his present day version leaving her.

His lips were not gentle against hers, his hand clasping her cheek and chin in his palm as he held her lips against his. He was unrestrained, untamed and coursing with need, desire and lust just as she was.

Sirius pried her lips open with his tongue, her getting a mix of whisky and chocolate from his lips as she moaned at the invasion and rolling her hips against his at the sensation. Her hands had snaked into his hair for grip and need for him as he mimicked her hands on her back and neck. He pinned her against the cushions, her body arching as she battled for dominance as he sunk his teeth into her bottom lip as she moaned.

His hands trailed down her skin, grabbing her forcibly by her thighs as she moved up the sofa. He pinched at her skin, his head tilting to the side as he deepened their kiss, swirling his tongue over hers as she felt her body reacting to her need for him.

Sirius pulled her from the cushion, rolling her on top of his lap as his hands roamed up her back, pinning her to him. She held onto his neck for support before he carried her, her lips spreading into a smirk as she knew where he was taking her. Hermione had felt her body crave and desire for his touch before he even pressed her into the mattress, it all spiralling out of control when she watched him climb between her as she instinctively rolled her hips once more.

"Stop," he breathed as their lips parted, his eyes a dark molten silver. "I want to make you feel good."

His mouth was moving to the side of her neck as he bit down, owning her and marking her in one. She whimpered at the pain and pleasure mixing, her hands grabbing at his raven locks as she wanted nothing more than to feel his skin against hers. Her brain had seized and only the voice shouting that she wanted him could be heard. He sucked hard on her skin, travelling down to her collarbone where he grazed his teeth over the ridge, shivers running down to her core as she tried to contain the wish to brush against him.

It was as if he read her mind, his hands moving down her hips as he trailed over her thighs and she was surprised at how soft they were. His fingers slid up her skin and as she began to move to allow him better access he had slid two fingers into her slick, wet heat. The intrusion caused her to cry out, a low growl emerging from him at the sweet sound as he kissed her thighs before biting down on her skin.

She buckled her hips as he slowly slid in and out, her need for more friction was more than her need for air. His warm breath against her thighs was making her lose what little conscious she had as one of his hands pressed on her hips to keep her in place.

Hermione felt like fire and glass, knowing she was a moment away from breaking but in complete need of the man between her legs, the man who created such a passion in her she couldn't breathe. This was her man; this wasn't strange or odd, she rationalised, he was hers and would eventually be officially hers too.

"Look at me," his fingers touching her sensitive velvet, the pad of his thumb brushing over her nub as she caught his eyes before moaning. "Look," sliding his fingers further into her before slowly exiting, "at me."

Her eyes washed with his. Blue and grey, swirling in their darkened states as her lips shaped into an o, his chest vibrating against her leg at the expression.

"I want to see your lips part when I make you come," the phrase alone near made her fall over the edge, never mind the sultry voice it was said in. The knot in her stomach was tightening as he began to build friction and speed, her back arching as she signalled where she wanted him to touch, her hands grabbing at the sheets as he did. "So, beautiful. So fucking beautiful."

His hips were rolling into the mattress, her mind wanting to feel him inside of her but her voice couldn't speak those words. She was rendered useless as her brain focused on one task and one task only:  _keeping her eyes on him_. A whimpered moan emerged from her that seemed so foreign that if they weren't alone, she wouldn't have thought it was her. His thumb was brushing over her heated nub as she began to thrust against his fingers, her wetness coating him and her breaths hitching.

He twisted the fingers inside of her, building the speed against her most sensitive area as she let out a passionate cry, her hips bucking against him as he felt her tense like a vice around him. He swept his thumb over her before swirling it twice, and he felt her spasm.

He saw the explosions in her eyes; he must have done because all she saw was white. She felt alive for the first time in weeks; she felt powerful and full of strength. Her body was flickering around him as her fingers spread out over the sheets, and where she thought that was it, a sudden new texture brushed over her sensitive flesh. His head was out of view, his fingers slowly moving from her as they moved to a thigh each.

"Sirius..." Hermione moaned as his hand slid up her thigh, pulling her dress up with it. "Oh... _fuck_."

"Naughty, even now," he breathed as the warmth of it sent shudders through her. "Patience, you need to learn patience. You always needed to learn patience."

Hermione wanted to splutter that she needed him now more than ever, but he seemed to have read her mind again, and with a swift movement he had buried himself up to the hilt inside of her. He groaned at the tightness and the texture, his fingers gripping onto her in a bruising way as she relished in it. Her hand slid up the nightie, his eyes darkening even more at the exposure of her breasts and his teeth took one nipple between them.

She wanted to hiss in pleasure, but as he swished his tongue over, she curled her hips into his slow thrust as he filled her once more. He wanted to mould her just for him, keep her this perfect for himself forever. "Fuck princess, so tight, so wet..." he managed to breathe, and she relished in his voice, closing her eyes and keeping all of this for when she returned alone.

Every stroke released a new sensation, each mark on her skin made her lust for more, and as she thought she could feel no more, she did. Each thrust he filled her completely, and each meet of their eyes made her quiver around his cock. She wrapped her legs tighter around his core, her nails digging into his neck as she begged him for more. Harder, faster, harder, faster over and over again.

It was only as he grabbed her lip with his, breaking apart as he groaned that he lost all semblance of control with her. His hands took a firm grip on her lower back and hips, slamming into her as she watched him drive into her with a force she had never known, but wanted always.

It was as if by magic, something inside of her made sense, bonding her to him even like this, even with the time and place all being wrong. The pieces that had broken when present-Sirius passed, suddenly snapped together, connecting her back to him. She flipped open her unknowing closed eyes; steel eyes fixed on her as he felt it too and she could no longer hold on, the wave preparing to crash down as she let out an almighty cry with a mixture of his name and incoherent moans. He had stolen several more thrusts before she saw stars in the silver, a cry from him that sounded more animal than human as he suddenly collapsed beside her.

"I love time travel," Sirius laughed as she joined him, her head turning to meet his.

"I love you," she breathed. Needing to say it as her body moved away from his, beginning to hate her bodily desires and wishing she hadn't made such a spectacle of herself.  _I love this you_ , the you that you become, she began to think. Her heart-breaking and confusion mounting over what all of this meant. Hermione realised with each second that passed the error of her ways as the tear inside of her grew. She realised that she would have to start mourning all over again; mourning for the husband she lost and the boyfriend she would have to leave behind.

Her eyes couldn't stop staring at him; not able to break from him as if she hadn't quite had her fill off him just yet. She wanted to commit all of him to memory, each chiselled line and each smile he sent her way. Hermione missed them all; she missed everything about this man and her man. Although, she still couldn't believe they were the same person.

Sirius raised his arms, his fingers tapping the wood above him and she remembered how often he had done this. 'Playing the drums,' she would say amused, and he would always give her a grin that sparked a fire in her stomach. He wasn't her husband yet; he wasn't even the _Sirius she had lost._ He was not the Sirius that would give her that grin; he had far more loss to endure and more betrayal to live with.

Tears began to form in her eyes, and she clasped her hands to her face as they began to fall, all the overwhelming feelings rising once more. "I'm sorry, I just needed to..." Her voice broke off, wanting to say stupid things like, 'feel you' or 'have you touch me'. "I needed to, let off some steam," Hermione choked out.

He smirked darkly, his eyes still a shade of grey she hadn't seen, "it's not the last time we do that... or the first."

Hermione dropped her hands slowly; her mouth parted slightly waiting for him to say that it was a joke. It never came.

* * *

**April 2005  
** _Three weeks before Time-Turner_

Her eyes were shimmering, crystal tears falling from them as she gasped and rasped for air. The sound of footsteps were nearing as she gripped his body tighter to hers, his blood coating her shirt and skin.

"Look at me," she gasped, his eyes travelling to hers. "Help is coming, okay? Hold on, please."

"Her - Hermione," Sirius breath disjointed, his eyes flickering as his hand reached her cheek. "I - I - I have always, always l - l loved you..."

Her lips were kissing his hand as she pulled him closer to her, her own tears falling down onto his wounds. The sparkle of her ring in the light shone on them from the sun coming through the shop's window, his pale face being lit up, his weeping cuts exposed to her.

"Y - you are - re - so, so gr - eat. Ama - amazing even," Sirius stuttered. "Be - best thing - g - that - ever - ever happ - pp - happened to m - me," her breath halting as he met her eyes, peace flooding the two of them for a second.

She got lost for a moment, a flurry of memories hammering her busy mind as she replayed each one. It was only the sound of his gasping from the pain that brought her back as she looked down at him, his silver eyes that were engraved into her brain watching her intently.

Hermione's face turned to meet the police and a friendly face that she knew would help. Remus's eyes which looked as broken as hers was, his mouth parting as she screamed for them to help, to save him. His hand was clenching her cheek as she began to shake, tremble from pain and hurt at losing him. Her throat was aching from the screams, from begging and as she looked down at him, the sparkle was gone. His arm falling limply to the ground.

"No... no, no no, no!" Hermione's hands were shaking him, tugging him closer as she pressed her head to him. "Come on, this isn't funny," she said to him, "wake up, okay? Help is here, look, please!"

"Hermione..." someone said from behind.

"Sirius, baby," she continued as her jaw clenched from the tears, her face covered in the water of her pain. "Baby, no... okay. I love you this; this isn't meant to happen. Not to us. Baby?"

"Hermione?"

Her face turning to meet their friend, his childhood friend. Tears were streaming down her cheeks as she bent down, his hand resting on her shoulder. The pain in her chest only intensified with the look in Remus' eye as she looked at him.

"Hermione —"

"— Don't," she hissed. "Don't, I can't leave him, he's coming back."

"He's gone," Remus whispered to her. "He's gone."

* * *

**xox**


	5. Fairytales

**AN:** I am so happy that you are all loving this as much as me. Thank you so much for the reviews/follows/favs and love. Crikey, I love you all!

 **Beta/Alpha/Just all the Love** : A massive, huge thank you goes to _SlytherinPrincessNurse1992_  for being the best cheerleader I could ask for, she also pushes me to write more Sirius and more Remus; treats for you all.

* * *

**Chapter Five**

* * *

_We know full well there's just time_  
_So is it wrong to toss this line?_  
_If your heart was full of love_  
_Could you give it up?_  
\- -  **Birdy** , Not About Angels

* * *

**Summer 1979**

The silence was still hanging thickly in the air, adding an uncomfortable layer of uncomfortableness upon them. Hermione hadn't known what to say. She knew that she couldn't continue to lie here. Even if he was hers, to begin with, this still felt wrong, and it still felt like a betrayal to be in his arms when her younger counterpart could come home at any moment.

This wasn't the Sirius she had shared a life with; not the same man she had in her own time. This was a Sirius that didn't even know hardship yet; a man who hadn't known what the war would take from him. This Sirius still pranked people. He still drank whisky in the aim of giving himself liver damage, he smoked to control his stress and this Sirius, didn't love her quite as intensely.

 _He was so incredibly sexy though, just like her Sirius,_  she thought to herself.

Confliction was rising inside of her. Clearly, Hermione wasn't even aware of what right or wrong was anymore. The two had merged, bent and contorted to exactly what she needed, rather than what was right. It seemed exactly how time was. Hermione was as brittle, as lost as time could be, and she wasn't sure where to go from here.

Hermione had once been called intelligent; she had even once been logical and sensible. She wasn't a person who messed with time and had sex with a man younger than her, even if he was the man she had once been with. The truth was bearing down on her and lighting up in front of her eyes, not allowing her to ignore it anymore: She simply wasn't comfortable with this anymore, none of it.  _Him, this_ , the two of them, what had just happened and that was before she even considered that this wasn't a one-off occurrence.

The idea that she frequently travelled back to see him only confirmed her suspicions, the pain she was feeling would never diminish, and she would never gain any self-control. Hermione felt as though she was staring down a long black hole and instead of that flickering light, that hope. There was nothing; there was no hope of a better tomorrow.

Apparently, there was just the past.

Shame had never been an emotion that she dealt with well, but wrapped in the arms of a man she wanted to take with her; she felt it stronger than ever. It flooded her cheeks, burning them as she hated how amazing it felt to be close to him. The parts of her that had felt lost, were now home. The pieces of her that had broken off in grief had found their places upon her, and she almost felt stronger.

Hermione put her hands on her forehead, attempting to soothe an oncoming headache from thinking too intensely.

_Would this ever get easier; would this ever be bearable?_

Her eyes widened as a disturbing thought popped up in her already busy mind. It hit her like a spell, burned like fire and hurt as much as the curse that she took during the Department of Mysteries; the one that nearly cost Sirius his life, the one that caused her to near stumble into the Veil. It was horrible and blinding thought that reminded her that if this was all preset, if this was all 'meant to be', that meant that in her time Sirius had been sleeping with the version of herself that had come back. He had been, in a strange and not real way, been cheating on her with her older counterpart.

_Has he always known? Had he always been waiting to see when she would disappear and travel back for some comfort with his younger self? Would he have thought that was where she went when she stormed off to Harry's?_

The thought, the bitterness in her throat, alarmed her. Knowing that never in her own time would she ever be able to convince him that was not what she was doing. Hermione would never be allowed the chance to say to him, that he was  _enough_ and that as long as he was alive, it would just be him.

"I can hear your brain whirling," Sirius whispered beside her, planting soft peppered kisses along her shoulder. Hermione had tensed for a moment before she soothed, knowing with a heavy heart that none of the pedantic's mattered, her Sirius from her time was gone, and if she could have this one, she would take the one available to her.

Her hands slowly moved down to cover her eyes as she blinked back tears, hating how his touch was sparking so many memories that were currently flooding all of her common sense. She hated that none of this was her choice, not now that she really thought about it. Did she ever even stand to have a choice? It didn't seem that way, and it also seemed that no matter what, her brain was against her. First pushing her here in the first place and now ridding her with guilt for doing so.

Sirius paused, sighing as she felt his warm breath against her skin. "Before you say something with a lot of syllables and a lot of large words, I am still coming down from my high of sleeping with what I hope, from the ring on your finger, is my wife from a few years away," his chuckle at his own comedic reply made her smile. "So go easy on a young pup when you unload all the feelings that are currently making your ears smoke," his finger twirling her hair around his fingers.

"How are you so…  _okay with this_?"

Hermione heard him sigh, one that seemed heavy and filled with more seriousness than she associated with him.

"Would a cake make you feel better?" Sirius asked, tugging her hand from her face. His steel eyes were twinkling amongst the skin free from lines of his troubles and his body tense as he lay beside her, all free from prison tattoos. "The you that is here, like this morning… I think that you like cake. Do you still like cake?"

Hermione softly smiled, wanting to laugh that nothing ever change. He always was so hellbent on making her feel better, he always was. "We baked —" her voice hitching in her throat as she tried to breathe, fighting the building force of tears and anger as she attempted to squish it down before he became suspicious. Even if he ever did ask questions, lay beside him naked was not a time she wished to deal with them. "We bake a lot now."

Sirius looked at her with wide eyes as if he couldn't quite believe it, "we do? Am I any good? Do I get better?" He raised his free hand to run through his medium length hair, all raven and contrasting to the perfect crisp pillowcase beneath his head.

"You are more of a distraction," she laughed as he wiggled his eyebrows and she swatted him softly. "You always was."

"You love me all the same."

Hermione nodded, fighting once more as she felt the burn in her chest, "that I do."

* * *

**Summer 2000**

_He picked her up, her shirt covered in flour and her head thrown back with a laugh imprinted in her cheeks before he threw her over his shoulder. It hurt to laugh from this position but she was unable to stop, the sight of the kitchen turned upside down with cake mixture plastered to every surface was a sight to behold. Her favourite clock was clicking, stuck in its motions from the cake mixture caking it._

_"Is this the fairy tale you always wanted, Mrs Black?"_

_Her head lifting as the last parts of the laugh remained on her cheeks and lips, her flour-covered hand reaching to touch his cheek, "better," his eyes widening as he began to smile. "So much better."_

_"Do we have time to go upstairs?" Sirius wiggled his brows._

_Hermione looked at the oven and rolled her eyes, "the cake is ruined anyways, someone ate all the batter anyways and what wasn't eaten is on every surface."_

" _Well," Sirius whispered darkly as he wiped a part of it from her cheek and licked it from his finger. "You know how much I love to taste things off your sweet body; cake mixture was on my list."_

" _You, are a dog, Sirius Black."_

_Sirius laughed genuinely, carrying her from the mess that they had made through the living room of their flat, "you married me."_

" _What a mistake that apparently was… Maybe I was confunded two months ago, that was how I said yes, " she jested, his fingers pinching her bum as she giggled loudly, swinging from over his shoulder as he shut the bedroom door with his foot._

* * *

**April 200  
** _Days Before Time-Turner_

Her hand turned over the next page of the photo album, thick tears falling onto the plastic they were encased in as she ran her finger over his smiling face. She wasn't sure if she loved the ones where he remained frozen in time or the ones that moved and showed the moment. There was such a unique beauty in each; she would never be able to pick not that she ever wanted too. Each moment meant something to her; each laugh made her realise how truly happy they had been.

 _ **This**_ , she thought as she brushed her whole hand over the photo, was her favourite.

Hermione closed her eyes, transporting to the time after the second war. The two of them sprawled in the sheets of his childhood bed, and his hand was playing with the camera she had been attempting to fix for weeks. She didn't know why she had been insistent on fixing it, even now as she reflected, but she was glad she did. She remembered how annoyed she was that he kept clicking it, no flash coming from it at all which irritated her all the more.

" _Why do you love me?" Hermione asked as she lay against his bare chest, the thumping of his heart in her ears. She could smell the scent of sex in the air from their post-War celebration as he clicked the button on the camera, hissing in disappointment that it wasn't working._

_"I always have fun with you," Sirius replied with a shrug, seemingly distant as if his attention wasn't on her._

She lifted her head to look at him in surprise, his eyes moving to her from the camera but his fingers still fiddling, she could hear it, right down her ear. "That's, why you love me?"

His shoulders shrugged, moving the camera closer to look at it before replying, "seems the best person to fall in love with. Someone I can always have fun with and someone who makes me smile. I've had an entire lifetime of misery, but never with you." He clicked something, a powerful flash filling the room as he smirked. "I have never had a single moment with you that wasn't utterly beautiful."

_Hermione looked at him mixed with annoyance and disappointment, "you fixed it," she said downcast._

_Sirius turned the camera, so it faced them, his lips pressing into her cheek before clicking it and another flash painted the room as she moved her own lips to kiss his as he clicked it again, polaroid's falling to the bed as he continued to click as their backs met the sheets once more._

Hermione ran her fingers down the picture, the two of them frozen in the sheets, in a time where they would never have imagined being apart from one another. It had been a moment caught in the calm; something they should have been suspicious of after all they had been through. It was utterly unexplainable to anyone, but even after all the two of them had been through it was then that she really wished never to let him go from. It was when he was more relaxed; when he was always ready to fight.

While she would never regret having their son, it had been different before he had arrived.

Hermione was not mad at anything except the irony of it all. The choice she made that two wars and prison and near death had nearly torn them apart but in the sheets of post-sex was when she decided she would finally accept his  _till death do us part_ , and then death took him only a few years later. She often pondered whether them marrying had been the very thing to seal his fate, she wondered if they had remained 'living in sin' would they have tried so hard to 'live their lives', would they have remained content or would they have always been on edge just like they should have been.

Hermione turned the page of the album, seeing the very first picture of what they had made. The breathtaking mid-cry of their son after he had been introduced to the masses and he looked more like Sirius at that moment than any other. She remembered how fussy Sirius had been, how much he held him and that she would turn around for all of two seconds and find him in his arms, Sirius carrying him around whispering sweet nothings in his ear. He was never fussy for his dad, something that Sirius relished in.

She wished that he had been able to see his son grow older. Hermione wished that she had of just let him go and get his son when he had cried that morning; she wished she had not of insisted on doing it herself. She wished that she wouldn't have to celebrate his first birthday alone; she wished that Sirius was here blowing up balloons for her the Muggle way - the way she liked it.

What Hermione hated the most, was that it had been only a week later that their son finally surrendered his first word. The first word they had both been betting on and dying to hear.

It hurt all the more when he did, his little finger pointing to the picture on the dresser in his room, the one beside the tiny dog teddy from his Uncle Remus. It was as though their son suddenly realised that he hadn't seen the cheeky smile of his father and his eyes filled with tears, pointing with urgency as he said, ' _Dada,'_ and Hermione was sure the last fragment of her heart shattered in her chest.

* * *

**xox**


	6. Running

**AN:** You are all far too kind to me. Thank you so much for all the wonderful reviews, you all make me smile far more than I should. The song for this week is a personal favourite of mine and the very song that began this whole thing. Let me know your thoughts, as always.

 **Beta/Alpha/Just all the Love** : A massive, huge thank you goes to _SlytherinPrincessNurse1992_  for being the best cheerleader I could ask for, she also pushes me to write more Sirius and more Remus; treats for you all.

* * *

**Chapter Six**

* * *

_Wrapped up, so consumed by all this hurt_  
If you ask me, don't know where to start  
Anger, love, confusion  
Roads that go nowhere

—  **Jess Glynn** , Take Me Home

* * *

**Summer 1979**

Hermione slowly began to dress. She felt so hollow when she knew that she should feel so full, regret washing over her at time spent being foolish; especially when she could be using the time wisely to bring peace to her broken soul. 

Her feet grazed over the dust, remembering fondly how messy they were back then; they had been so carefree, but then they hadn't had much to worry about other than how they were to pay the bills. There had been a war, but their part in it hadn't begun to form, and their losses were not in the many as they were in her time. Hermione's hands began to struggle with the buttons to undo her dress, frustration mounting and wanting to make minimal noise so that she could escape. It was the last thing she needed, him seeing her go, asking more questions she knew she couldn't answer even though she was desperate to.

"Please, don't go," Sirius murmured as she slipped her the garment over her hips, her eyes fixing on the dent in the floorboard. Fond memories were hammering against her already fragile judgment as she remembered the laughter that had caused that dent. "Just… come, lie on my chest. I know… I hope you still like that."

Hermione couldn't help the smile that formed; her tear filled eyes were meeting his wandering ones, and for a moment she was sure she would shatter. Her morals were already withering, and she was a breath away from disappointing her old self. Hermione was so close; she had the chance to change things if she chose, but that power felt wrong to carry. The opportunity to be happy not could mean unhappiness even earlier than she felt, but Hermione wasn't sure she could let the part of her that lived here, in this time, suffer.

"Hermione," Sirius whispered softly from the bed. "You know, I love you and… whatever you're running from, it's fine not to face it right this moment."

_If only that were true. You're gone, Sirius._

Hermione cried out in her head, her eyes watering as she clenched them shut unwilling to let him see this side of her. All her dreams were already taken, only loss and sadness were left inside of her.

_I'm running from being alone, don't you see._

She opened her eyes begrudgingly, not wanting to miss a second more of being able to see him and cement this all in her mind. This place, this would be the happy place she would return to when her own world became too much to live in. "I have someone who needs me," she sniffed, her shaking hand rising to wipe her cheeks.  _Your son,_ she mumbled behind her hand.

Hermione was sure he knew. Sirius had always been able to read her; he could always tell as if he had a sixth sense about these things. Sirius Black was a notorious pain in the arse, but he was always right, and she hated that.  _Especially now_. There was a longing in his eyes, a frustration that was mounting and Hermione wanted to scream that she understood. That this wasn't meant to happen and she needed him to be strong and let her go because none of this was easy for her.

He sighed as if the very world was on his shoulders. "I need you." Three words that cut deep into her and hurt a part of her she had long thought was dead.

The sentiment made her laugh; the pain made her laugh. It came out rather manic, emotionally dead and cold. It was never her intention; she was just tired and confused. In truth, she had endured enough. There was little control in her, and that anger that she had felt at his passing was returning with a force greater than before. "You have  _a me,_ Sirius," she commented. "One that is far more age appropriate."

He scoffed as if that was a ridiculous thing to say when she, in fact, was the very person he so wished to trade her for. The very thought irked her, hating him a little that he was so quick to trade her in without even knowing why she had come, he hadn't even asked, he hadn't even bothered to question what she was running from.

Unless...  _what if he had attempted to ask before? What if he already knew?_

Hermione looked at him questionably, his eyes sparkling as she did and she hated how much she wanted to dive into the pools before her. "I don't know how I feel about you trading me in for an older model?" She said, knowing that if she didn't say something the thought would fester in her mind and undo the happiness she had experienced with the Sirius she had lost.

Sirius threw back the sheet, exposing the crumpled bedsheets that she had been laying on only moments ago, "I have a feeling that you need me more, love."

Her smile began to grow realising that the Sirius here, was not the Sirius she had lost. The Sirius from her time was wiser than this one; his skin marked from suffering. It could have been this very moment that pushed him to be the man she knew, and while she wished to change so many things, that would never be one of them. At least, if he grew to be the man she would love with all of her heart, that would be a positive she could live with. "You can't have us both," Hermione whispered, hating that she was even speaking those words.

He winked, "your younger self would understand. Plus, you've learnt a lot more than the version of you that went to work," Sirius said cheekily, winking to seal the point.

Hermione bit down on her lip as she fought the grin that he was coaxing out of her because it all sounded right when he said it like that. But this wasn't her time. He wasn't hers. He was immature, and in a while, he'd make an immature decision and rip her heart out. If she stayed she'd change that, maybe their son wouldn't be born, and he had done nothing wrong, he didn't deserve to be erased.

Plus, how would she explain herself to herself? People have…

"I can't," she said stopping her brain from whirling. Hermione knew in her state she would make an excuse, she would remain here because she couldn't face their son, she couldn't meet the many faces that wanted to ask so many questions. "You should walk me to the door,"  _so I can say bye to you,_ she felt her brain speak. "It would be horribly rude if you don't."

"And I'd hate to be rude," he smirked, throwing his long legs out from the sheets. None of him afraid from being exposed, Hermione wasn't afraid of committing  _all of him_  to memory for later, he was rather athletic in this time.

* * *

**Spring 1977 - Hogwarts Castle**

_"You, are blushing."_

Her eyes were meeting Marlene's, "I am not."

"You are," Lily teased. "What boy has you blushing like a lantern?"

"Just someone from home."

Hermione had assumed that would be the end of it, her eyes returning to the book over the dinner table and ignoring the others and their conversations on boys. It wasn't; it never was. It was as though he had ears trained to hear conversations spoke about him or other males.

Sirius had appeared in a flash, his body flushed against hers, pushing Hermione against the shelf of the broom cupboard not far from the Great Hall. While she would usually be bothered by his sudden appearance, she wasn't; she had missed him, craved him. His lips were against her neck as her fingers moved into his dark hair. His darkened grey eyes, even in the darkness, was busy absorbing all of her as if he hadn't seen her for a while.

His hands on her like they had missed her, even if it had only been a night; guiding and caressing all of her and she never wanted him to stop. Hermione wanted his hands never to leave her, she wanted them to touch her in places that only belonged to him, and as she met his eyes, she hoped he could see the lust in them and the need she felt deep within.

 _"So,"_ Sirius said as he kissed up her neck."A man has caught your eye."

"Hmm," Hermione moaned softly into his lips.

 _"Someone from home,"_  his eyes meeting hers, a smirk crossing his lips before his lips crushed hers. Her core was contracting at the force. _"He sounds like a swell guy."_

"Oh, he's the worst."

"I bet he is," his lips smothering hers as he grasped at her waist, tugging her shirt from her skirt. The feel of his hands against her skin was something sent from heaven, his fingers leaving delight where ever they touched. "I bet your father wouldn't approve."

"Oh no, he definitely would not," Hermione whispered, as she moved her hand down to cup his length.

"I," he said between taking her breath, stealing more kisses and groaning at her fingers grazing over his bulge. "Love you."

Hermione stared deeply into his eyes, not ever thinking she could tire from the sight of a turned-on Sirius Black at her hand. "And I, you."

* * *

**April 2005  
** _Two Days before Time-Turner_

She wiped the tears that were falling, painting the fakest smile she could muster over her face as she moved into her son's room. His cries were heartbreaking; if only her heart weren't already shattered beyond repair, she was sure it would ache.

Hermione scooped him up from his cot, his cries seeming to stifle as soon as she did and she didn't hide her relief at this. Her eyes gazed over the little one. The boy that was more Sirius than her.

" _Just you wait," Sirius once said. "He'll have your brains and your love of books."_

" _I would rather that than your petulant for trouble."_

_Sirius had thrown his head back, locks falling down his neck and back as he lifted the boy in the air, "do not play innocent with me, Black," his eyes looking at her lovingly. "You're just as bad as the rest of us."_

As much as she had once wished and declared that untrue, she couldn't now. Not after the days of reflection and the days remembering the old times as she tried to hold onto something that was already gone. She hoped that he was a mini-Sirius, just so she wasn't alone; so she had a part of him always. She hoped that he would grow to have a love for pranking and that he wanted to get up to mischief; somehow she imagined she wouldn't be so lucky. Somehow she thought that life would be that cruel, she would probably end up with a mini-Remus, not that it would be a bad thing, but she had always hoped the qualities in Sirius would be passed on.

Hermione placed the boy on her hip, the corner of her mouth twitching as he rested his head on her shoulder as she brushed her hand through his dark black hair and his wide grey eyes stared up at her as if she was a wonder of the world. She knew she would have given up long before now if it wasn't for him, not that those feelings were ones she should be having.

She walked over to the armchair in the corner. The chair that had seen many a sleepless night and those memories were the ones that flooded her as she sat down. Old arguments about her leaking breasts and swollen feet, Sirius groaning that there was never room for him and that their son loved her more. They were silly now, but at one time they were the centre of their world.

Hermione missed the little fights; she would have them all over again if it meant that she could have him back.

She felt the boy's hand stick on her cheek, her head turning as she kissed his little palm and the sweetest laugh emerged from him, and she was sure it healed a fraction of her. Hermione wondered if this is what Sirius had meant when he heard her laugh, that it made him more complete than he had ever known. She buried her head against his, not caring that tears were falling now because she just wanted her angel, her saving grace.  _Her Sirius._

Her son began to cry as if he knew she was in pain and couldn't fix it. She wanted to cry herself, she wanted to scream just as he was doing but she knew there was little use. Instead, she rested her head against the back of the chair, letting the pain wash down her cheeks and join the others that were collecting on her t-shirt as she brought him close to her chest.

Someone would come soon;  _they always did._  They would take her son from her arms in the hope it would bring her some peace; it never did, and she always wanted to tug him back. There was very little fight in her to do so. Instead, Hermione would end up watching her son descend downstairs in the arms of someone more together than she.

A part of her resented them for it; she knew that she shouldn't. Their ' _help'_  was more like babysitting; making sure that she 'didn't do anything stupid'. Hermione could admit that she would rather crawl into a black hole than deal with the world, but the world wasn't her son, and she couldn't ignore him. Even if she wanted too, her heart wouldn't let her. That mothering bond that connects a mother to their child and gives off that sense when something is wrong, it had been twisting inside of her since Sirius had passed - she was thankful for this.

Hermione wasn't convinced that her son knew anything, but she didn't have the energy to fight Remus on why he was wrong and instead choosing to remain silent. She let him harp on about positive energy and her needing time to heal - she would still say nothing.

_Silence is the best conversation killer. The silence was comforting and didn't ask a lot of her. Silence meant she could remember._

"Shh," she tried to soothe as the boy began to cry once more.

Hermione  _needed_  to comfort him so that she could feel like she wasn't an utter waste of space as a mother and person.

"Reggie," she whispered, and he hiccuped in her arms, their eyes meeting, and she was sure he was looking at her with a perplexion only an adult could do. "It's okay baby boy," she choked out as she lied to her child. "It will all be okay tomorrow," repeating the words his Daddy use to say.

* * *

**xox**


	7. Goodbye...Again

**Beta/Alpha/Just all the Love** : A massive, huge thank you goes to _SlytherinPrincessNurse1992_ for being the best cheerleader I could ask for, she also pushes me to write more Sirius and more Remus; treats for you all.

* * *

**Chapter Seven**

* * *

_Remember it now it takes me back to when it all first started_  
_But I only got myself to blame for it and I accept it now_  
_It's time to let it all go, go out and start again_  
_It's not that easy_

 _-_ **Kodaline,** High Hopes 

* * *

**Summer 1979**

They had not made it to the front door. The two of them falling in another mess of limbs, landing on the old orange sofa as their clothes were torn from their skin as they lost themselves in one another.

Hermione couldn't even hate herself for being weak this time; one look at him and she turned into jelly. It had also been, well mind-blowing to say the least; like exactly how she imagined goodbye sex to be. She knew she would be going home with marks Hermione had never experienced, and as much as Hermione had protested for years about him biting her shoulder, she had quite enjoyed it when he had sunk his teeth into her after an amazing twist of her hips she knew drove him crazy.

Hermione snuggled her head between the crook of his chest and shoulder, her fingers trailing the triangle under his chest before it met his abdomen and she imagined where his tattoos would go. Where her name would go and where their sons would be placed. It was the oddest thing, seeing him with all her memories how he was when she first fell in love with him. It was horrid to know that in a few years he would be rotting away in prison, herself of this time doubting him and discrediting everything that they had been through before it.

"You don't get over that then," Sirius croaked, clearing his throat and she had to smile at the sound. The very croak that made him give up cigarettes for her, the croak that drove her mad when he fell asleep beside of her years in the future. "Thinking too loud," he clarified, and she smiled. "Oddly silent, did I _fuck_ the words out of your brain?"

Hermione closed her eyes, "still as vulgar as I remember."

Sirius smirked, his other hand stretching out above him. "You can't change perfection, love."

Her fingers stretched up his chest, her tip-toes pushing her up as she pressed a kiss on his jaw before he turned to meet her lips with his. _Almost perfect,_ she thought to herself as he lightly nipped on her bottom lip. She remembered how passionate 'her Sirius' was with her, how needy he was to have her, and this Sirius hadn't known quite that level yet.

Hermione knew, at this stage, they had never been apart. It was something even in the future she knew she would never allow to happen again after they had, it had been too hard. It dawned on her that this Sirius became the Sirius she married because of Azkaban; she still hated the place, but a new insight was gained.

She was about to get lost in another kiss that she knew would lead to him moving between her thighs and filling her already sore core when she heard a voice that chilled her.

"What time… _am I home_?" She asked him. "Is that _me?!_ "

Sirius chuckled as her face paled, "aren't you the one from the future?" Her smile unchanging as his dropped at his joke deadpanning in the room. "Not into humour; you will be."

"Will you…" Hermione's frustration was mounting as she heard noise from outside the front door. "Just stop with that, with the… _you'll be back, you liked to_ ," she took a deep breath, feeling his fingers begin to massage her neck and as she closed her eyes, it made her almost forget that he wasn't hers. He wasn't quite, perfect. Hermione stood quickly from the bed, her vision going blurry from the rush and she rubbed her temple to ease it, "I have to go. It's not something that is up for debate, okay? One day you'll be accustomed to this, _apparently_ , so you must even now have some awareness of why I must go."

Sirius frowned. He looked as though he was disappointed and it made her question so many things she was sure she was about to explode. _It was all a mistake_ , she thought to herself painfully. _Everything is even more complicated now, why did I come?_ Hermione lectured to herself.

"I love you," was all he responded with and it should have felt better than it did to hear it. So why did it feel like knives slicing her open again?

* * *

**June 1978  
** _Hogwarts Graduation_

"So," Hermione sighed as she found his fingers. Enjoying the way that Sirius's fingers fit between hers so perfectly. "We are here at Graduation," her brown eyes finding his as he looked out over the field. She wondered what he was thinking, her dark haired and light eyed boyfriend who looked ridiculously calm. "About to _Graduate_!"

It was magical, he was even more magical, but that the two of them ending up here all in love even with the world against them. She was amazed that the man that would make her the happiest was the same man that had a family that condemned her very existence. Sirius would never let her worry about that, often reminding her how proud he was of her for all she overcame although, she never saw it that way.

To her, Hermione had grown up a little different but found a home when she came to Hogwarts. She had found beautiful friends who she adored, a man who Hermione wanted for the rest of her life and she found that she was talented at something other than the piano.

"That is usually the concept behind graduation," he grinned as she groaned beside him. Sirius turned to meet hers, and she basked in how beautiful they were, even if his teasing was irritating her today, "I am just amazed I'm not dead." She groaned as she moved closer to him, finding that his arm naturally moved around her and kept her close. "Because you know, target on my back."

"You'll have a target on your back if you don't stop ruining this moment," Hermione groaned as he kissed her head and muttered a sorry. "I cannot believe we are here; this is it Sirius," her head turning to face him. "Our lives are going to change."

"Not always for the worst though, love," Sirius said. "I mean we are going to get married, have a thousand babies, and I'm going to continue to sex you up until you're sick of me."

Hermione grinned, kicking the grass with her foot, "what if I'm pretty sick of you now?"

Sirius pulled her closer, the two moving flush against the other as she bit down a laugh as he lifted her chin up with his fingers. "You can be so hurtful at times."

"But you love me," she grinned, lifting on her tiptoes to peck a kiss on his lips.

"I do," Sirius smiled. "Forever, and always my love. You, are everything to me, till my last breath."

Hermione bit down on her lip, "my last breath," she repeated as he pressed a kiss to her forehead and pulled her even closer. Her eyes were taking a last look at their surroundings, not knowing if she'd get a chance later.

* * *

**April 2005  
** _Two weeks before Time-Turner_

It felt brilliant. Photo frames were smashing to the floor, plates splitting apart as they met the cold ground and looking exactly how she imagined her heart to look. Each time she heard something snap and break, it felt somewhat reassuring, and she hated the pleasure she felt at the surroundings being nothing but a mess. She felt less alone; less in pain.

Hermione stared around at the mosaic ruined floor, the floor that she had been rolling around on days earlier with Reggie and Sirius as they tried to convince their little one to walk. Hermione didn't even want to remember that now, she didn't want to keep that in mind, she wanted to imagine that there was no happiness in this room - just like there wasn't inside of her.

Hermione wanted it to be demolished; she wanted it to be shattered and unfixable just like she was. The idea that with a wave of her wand she knew it would all go back to how it once was made her hate the world she had come to love.

_Why was there not a spell for her heart? Or a spell to bring him back from the place he didn't ask to go? Why was she the one that was left behind?_

Blame would be worn on her shoulders for years; he would never have gone if not for her, and she would carry that with her every single day. Hermione knew the Muggle world better than him; it should have been her that went to the shop, she could have run, hid or protected herself at the very least. Sirius was never equipped for that; not after years of hiding.

Remaining here, at his childhood home, it all felt too wrong. It felt like the memories would eventually choke her and Hermione needed clean air, but she was afraid of what was outside; She was always afraid now, her rock had gone.

Hermione sunk to her knees, the crunching of glass sounding as she did and she dipped her head and looked at the brokenness around her. Thick, warm tears began to fall to her cheeks. They were soaked with the pain and agony that was tearing her limb from limb long before now, but she had never noticed. She had been praying for relief for days, yet none came. Hermione knew that without some release this pain was surely going to kill her, that was how strong it was; how horrid and suffocating it was becoming with each minute he wasn't here.

That was when her eyes caught the moving image of him, the one that grinned up at her as if trying to comfort her through the picture. Hermione's hand moved out to retrieve it, swiping the glass from his face as he looked at her fingers before smiling up at her as if she was his everything. She could hear him now, "you need to be stronger, Hermione," but she had nothing left in her to muster strength with, not without him.

Hermione pulled him close to her chest, sinking further onto her knees as she brought her chin down on top of the frame. She hated how much she had come to rely on him, but he had been the one to hold her apart, and he was the one that rooted her to the earth when she wanted nothing more than to surrender to it. Even now as she held him against her chest, her chin tilting down closer to it as she hoped it would fill her with something or provide the comfort he usually did.

As normal there was just a void. _Why was there always just a void?_ She wondered. _Why was there never any break in this suffocation?_

"Hermione?"

She didn't want to meet those eyes, those green eyes that would be full of concern and sadness. Remus knew nothing of this grief, he had lost him to jail, but never entirely like she had. He had his family, a wife, a child; Hermione had been left with just the latter. Her child that was more his father than her; the child that embodied everything about Sirius in his looks and everything of her in his mannerisms.

"I made you some tea," Remus spoke again, softer than before as if scared she would shatter.

Her head raised, Hermione looking at him as he stood in awe of the destruction of the room. "Tea won't fix this," she mumbled.

"Magic can."

Hermione couldn't help but scoff, hating how he was always oblivious to what she meant. He was supposed to be smart. It was the simple answer her friend gave that the tears fell as if the barricade she had build had finally given in and the dam was let loose. They fell for what felt like days, weeks and months; truthfully, it had been minutes.

Remus' hand found hers, her eyes squeezing shut as she tried to push herself together, not even for herself or her son, but for Remus. Even now, even with the weight of this loss she still couldn't stop thinking of someone else. Sirius always told her off for that; always joked that she would fall apart and he would have to spend hours glueing her back together.

The sentiment made her feel sick; she was so broken, so destroyed. Where was Sirius to stick her back together? Where?

"It will get easier," Remus offered.

Hermione choked back a sob, struggling and almost choking on it as she tried to speak. It was with great difficulty she met his eyes and said, " _when_?"

* * *

**xox**

* * *

This piece has been **nominated** in _**two categories**_ in the **Mischief Managed Awards 2017 hosted by The Shrieking Shack Society.** It has been nominated in _**Best Time Travel Fic & Best Underappreciated Fic - Cloak of Invisibility Award**_. I am so elated to have found this out, I can't thank you all enough & even just being nominated has made me smile.

Voting for the winners has **begun** and there is a link in my tumblr profile or FFN profile  **Voting ends on the 30th of April** and I would love nothing more than for you to vote for me - if that's okay (haha).

I have included a link also for all the other amazing pieces, there are some truly incredible pieces and I cannot believe that I am even amongst them.

**Thank you all so much, I adore you endlessly.**

* * *

**xox**


	8. The Return

**Beta/Alpha/Just all the Love** : A massive, huge thank you goes to _SlytherinPrincessNurse1992_ for being the best cheerleader I could ask for, she also pushes me to write more Sirius and more Remus; treats for you all.

* * *

Voting is still open for the Mischief Managed Awards 2017 hosted by the excellent 'The Shrieking Shack Society'; voting is open until the 30th.

This piece has been **nominated** in _**two categories:**_ _**Best Time Travel Fic & Best Underappreciated Fic - Cloak of Invisibility Award**_. Thank you all so much, this was just a little fic that started in my heart, and I'm touched you all love it.

* * *

**Chapter Eight**

**The Return**

* * *

_Pack my bag and let's get moving_  
_'Cause I'm bound to drift awhile  
_ _Though I'm gone, gone_

- **Creedence Clearwater,** Long As I Can See The Light

* * *

**April 2005 - Present  
** _The Day After Her Return_

Her body sunk down on the bed, her hands gripping the side of the duvet as she felt how wrong the softness was against her skin. It had only been hours she had left the younger him and mere seconds she had been back in her own time, but already her heart and soul pulled back to 1979.

Hermione's looked around the room, everything undisturbed, but nothing felt familiar. This place; her home, felt wrong to her now and not just because he was no longer here. It felt foreign to her; it felt awkward even to be here as if this was no longer her home.

Her hand clasped around the chain of the Time-Turner, wondering what on earth she was going to do with it. Destroying it seemed futile when there were so few of them left; keeping it provided an opportunity to return, not something she was sure she could handle a second time. It seemed foolish to make any rash choices when she was not in the right frame of mind, parting the chain as she slid it over her head and dropped the pendant down her dress.

Hermione pulled her hair out from the chain, her eyes catching the reflection in the mirror and the sight haunted her. Purple, beautiful bruises lingered over her pale skin, but it wasn't those that made her breath hitch. It was the circles under her eyes, the clear indication that she had not slept since Sirius hadn't been beside her. Her heart was barely beating, just like she was barely living - her appearance agreeing.

It was several long minutes of staring before she heard her stomach growl, hating that her human needs were interfering with her conscious quarrel. She wasn't sure how she could face everyone after what she had just done or knowingly meet their worried expressions when she was still considering going back.

Would they even miss her? Would anyone even realise that she was gone?

Passages from books began springing to mind, sentences dashing past her eyes as she despised her intellect and photogenic memory. Hermione didn't need to re-see the rules that she would never have broken. Time, she knew, was a fragile concept and she would not be the one to mess with it again - she felt she had learnt her mistake. Dangerous things had happened to those who messed with time, she had read about the repercussions in the newspaper from desperate souls who wished to live a life after the war, only to murder their older selves in confusion - she imagined that her younger self would most definitely do that. Younger Hermione wasn't untrusting, but she was jealous and far too passionate - she was thankful she hadn't lost her passion as she aged. Hermione suspected it was the passion that had kept the flame between them burning until he passed.

The risk was too great, and Hermione had nearly come to a decision of what to do with the Time-Turner hanging like a weight around her neck.

The cries of her child ceased her thoughts, the very reason that she would be missed chimed like an alert that she needed. Hermione rose from the bed, brushing down her dress as she smelt the aftershave of her Sirius from 1979 and her chest ached in regret.

_I miss you, Sirius. I miss both versions of you._

* * *

**Winter 1999**

"Do I even ask?"

He turned around at the sound of her voice, the kitchen of Grimmauld Place turned upside down - and apparently into a workshop for bikes.

Sirius Black stood in the hallway with oil over his former white vest top and his hair tied up in a bun on the top of his head. Hermione wanted to tell him how much of a fool he looked, but it was hard to ignore the heat growing in between her thighs as the sight of him rugged and dirty.

"You're back early," Sirius smiled, wiping his hands down his top as it showed the lines of the muscles she wished to run her teeth over. "I thought you'd be gone for longer; I wanted... to, get things tidied up."

 _Keep it messy;_ her head shouted as she glanced at the tensing muscles in his arms. Her head going to places she knew they shouldn't, like him picking her up with those arms, her teeth biting down on those arms as she gripped for support as he fu -

"Um, Hermione?"

Her eyes widened, and she could feel her cheeks burning. "Yes?" She managed to say with a mask of indifference.

Sirius smirked, dipping his head as he walked around the table and her breath hitched in her throat. Even before he touched her skin, her body had already lit up like London at nighttime. His stormy eyes looked up at her at the last minute, his lip curled in a way that made her want to throw her own at his and never let go.

"Are you alright?"

She tried to level her breathing, but this side of her and these thoughts were never things she had shared with him. Hermione had spent so much of her time preparing for the war, that now that it was over there were no distractions and her bodily urges seemed far more feral than they ever had been. They had shagged like mad, they had made love like star-crossed lovers, and they had fucked like enemies, but this desire; this passionate need that was growing inside of her was like a tsunami that wanted to crash and drown them both.

Sirius' fingers grazed her cheek as her head arched into more of his touch, their eyes meeting and she felt the electricity crackle between them.

"I want to fuc -"

Her words were lost to his mouth. His arms, doing exactly as she imagined and scooped her up as he dragged her to the counter and his tongue licked her lips. She could taste the salt of his labour and the sweetness of her coffee mixing to make something far more intoxicating than she had ever known or tasted; she wanted to bottle it - she wanted to bottle him.

Sirius placed her on the counter with ease and skidded the parts, of what was once a bike, away from the two of them before deepening their kiss as her mind shut down at the fire growing between them. His hand snaked into her hair, pulling it lightly as her chin raised and his lips broke from hers to nip her jaw teasingly.

"What d'ya want?" Sirius growled into her ear and Hermione could feel herself turning into goo. "Hermione," he groaned as he rolled his low-ridden, jean covered hips against hers. "What d'ya want?"

The words were on her tongue; she wanted to fire them out into the air and tell him of all her fantasies, every single one of her ravaging thoughts that had led to such explosive sex before now. Hermione wanted to let him into that part, not having any fear left in her, it was him and her until the end.

Sirius, never having been one for patience, gripped her bare thigh as the back of his hand pushed the skirt up as his calloused fingers grazed her skin on her inner leg. Her eyes opened, unaware they had even closed and met his with lust in his she knew she was mirroring.

"I told you," she gasped, embarrassment washing over her.

The wrong answer, she mused as his finger slid over her already damp knickers and she whimpered at the touch. Hermione was sure that he spoke; he must have because his breath was against her ear and her brain had long evacuated.

"I want you to fuck me, _on the counter._ "

It must have been the right answer as he stole another whimper from her with the pad of his thumb before his hands undressed her with a startling speed she hadn't ever seen him show. Hermione gazed seedily as he stripped his vest from his frame and watched all his muscles contort as she licked her lips. This is all mine; she chanted with a dirty smirk, all of him is mine. He thrust into her without caution, her bare skin met his sweat and oil covered body, and she never wanted it to part as her eyes caught the ring on her finger she hadn't got used too.

_Her fiance; the dirty kitchen biker who fucked her on counters._

* * *

**May 2005 - Present  
** _Two Weeks After Her Return_

Her hand remained wrapped over her side; it was a comforting position she had found soothed her during the first war. She hated that she had been through more than one, it seemed odd to think first and second when it came to genocide.

It had been a month since she had seen him in their old flat. It had been a week since she had taken off the Time-Turner and hidden it in the chest of drawers she barely went into. It was there, and that was all she needed to know.

Hermione had placed a smile on her lips just as she had applied mascara onto her lashes, it had become a part of her everyday routine now and was applied as easily as the foundation that hid her tired skin.

Everyone was here; they never left anymore. It was as though none of her friends trusted her to be alone, the thought alone had begun to bore Hermione rather than frustrate her. Hermione didn't complain about it anymore. Instead, she acted as if it didn't bother her and slowly, but surely, it didn't.

Hermione kept her eyes on her son, watching as he clapped full of joy when he got a brick into the correct hole, and his eyes would meet hers for approval. It was the only thing that kept her sane, his face; his happy and innocent face. His eyes, those were what haunted her until they closed and it was the only thing that hurt her on her son's face.

"Coffee?" The scent had hit her before the words had, and her eyes gazed up to see Remus offering her a warm smile. The marks he had gained this month seemed deeper than the previous, he seemed older this month, and usually, she would question why, but not today.

She took the mug from his hands, wrapping her fingers around it and savoured the feel of warmth against her cold fingers. "Thank you," Hermione replied politely.

"How're ya' doing?" Remus asked, his fingers raised to his lips as he frowned at the steaming mug in his hands.

The thought of Sirius laughing at his friend came to mind; the idea that Remus had scorched his lips with his coffee would have amused him. The room seemed lonely without laughter, especially Sirius'. The question was still lingering in the air, drifting and floating between them building awkwardness and tension she didn't need.

The question was stupid. Hermione wanted to hiss this at him, she wanted to thrust her ring in his face and inform him that her soul mate was dead so of course, she was peachy. Remus didn't deserve that, but if it had been anyone else that had asked that ridiculous question they would have got that exact answer. Remus, however, deserved only this.

"You have to take each day as it comes, _or so I have been told._ "

Remus bowed his head, the giggles of Reggie ringing out and it almost made her heart stop.

"He laughs like him," Remus whispered, seemingly to himself but she heard it without even trying. Words were failing her, not that she could offer much to their conversation anyways. "I miss him too. Y'know?"

She took back everything she had thought before, that comment, that innocent sentence angered her more than it should. Hermione's eyes flashed cold over him, half-hoping that he would freeze and break into ice cubes under her eyes. It was such an easy thing for someone else to say, especially one who had lost a best friend and not a lover.

Remus said it, as if she wouldn't have considered his grief or as if he was hinting that she was insensitive to him. Either of those things was preposterous, and she could feel the bubble of emotions that had been restrained down for far too long begin to rise to the surface.

"I wish I only missed him like you did," Hermione growled, the words falling out of her mouth without thought. Her hand slapped the mug into his chest, uncaring if the contents burned him. "I wish, that I had lost a best friend instead of my husband. I wish," she hissed, her tone laced with the most poisonous venom as she stared into his eyes unafraid of hurting her friend, "that I hadn't lost my everything, my soul, breath and heart. But you miss him, _right_? You missing him, trumps my grief, right?"

Before she knew it, her feet were hammering on the staircase. Her hand was shaking with fury as she ripped open her bedroom door and slammed it into its frame before anyone bothered stopping her. Hermione gripped her wand, throwing every single charm at the door that she could as tears rained down all around her. Exhaustion flooded her as she collapsed onto her knees, the dust on her floor rising around her and she wanted it to suffocate her. That was when her eyes met the drawer that it was located in, her answer, her happiness.

She wasn't sure if she could stay here without him, not anymore.

* * *

**xox**


	9. A New Beginning

**Beta/Alpha/Just all the Love** : A massive, huge thank you goes to _SlytherinPrincessNurse1992_ for being the best cheerleader I could ask for.

* * *

I am so happy to announce that this piece came second in two categories in the Mischief Managed Awards 2017 hosted by the excellent 'The Shrieking Shack Society'. The categories were _**Best Time Travel Fic & Best Underappreciated Fic - Cloak of Invisibility Award**_.  
Thank you all so much, this was just a little fic that started in my heart, and I'm touched you all love it enough to have nominated and voted for it.

* * *

**Chapter Nine**

**A New Beginning**

* * *

I'm sorry that I couldn't get to you  
Anywhere, I would've followed you  
Say something; I'm giving up on you  
- **A Great Big World** , Say Something

* * *

**31st October 1981**

Her hands delved into the lukewarm water, the bubbles slowly fading from around her fingers as she swished them around the bowl. He had said he would be back soon; that he just had to check something.

That had been hours ago, and Hermione was still stood at the sink in their kitchen. She couldn't concentrate on anything, knowing in her stomach that something horrible had happened because otherwise, he would be back. She tried to picture Sirius coming back through the door, a messed up bouquet in hand and a sheepish grin as he tells her he had to see James.

Hermione knew none of that could happen. The storm outside was enough for her to know that something terrible had happened, yet here her feet were. They were stuck to the ground and unwilling to move. She had let the tears fall over her cheeks as minutes turned into hours; the once steaming water turned colder.

Something had snapped inside of her, as though her heart had actually cracked and that was when her legs gave way. Her body was sliding down the side of the counter as she crumpled to her floor, her sobs echoing around the kitchen as she saw that it had gone midnight and he had been gone over six hours now. Her fingers had pruned as she shakingly raised her hand to wipe her chest free from her tears. Her body shook against the cabinet, the door that he had promised to fix rattling behind her.

"Hermione?"

She didn't raise her head; She didn't move her hair from her face because that voice wasn't one she wanted to hear. Hermione heard him sink to his knees before her, his hand reaching out gently, softly to touch her knee. As soon as it did she let it all out, the cries coming out in chokes as she tried to breathe and weep all at once.

She felt his fingers on her chin, her eyes rising as she met the scarred face through her hair. "James..." Remus tried to speak, his lip trembling as he tried to speak their names, the ones who had lost. "Lily... They're - they're dead and P-peter -"

Hermione frowned, "P-peter?"

Remus nodded, his body giving way to similar to hers as he fell to his rear and clutched his knees. Something inside of her was churning, the promise; the promise to never give up on him.

"No," she gasped.

"Yes," Remus wept as he lost all control. "He... That b-bloody bastard-d... He k-killed them all. Gave them u-p."

"No," she repeated, disbelief and something so powerful inside of her telling herself that it was a lie; a trick. "He-e wouldn't."

Remus who was rocking from side to side, the scars of his last moon so prominent on his face and his eyes full of sorrow. "He did. He did, Hermione. He killed my friends."

* * *

**May 2005 - The Present**

"Mama."

A word that should fill her with joy, but it barely scratched deep enough for her to feel a single thing. Hermione sighed, painting her smile on as she picked Reggie up and brought him close to her chest; the two falling back into the pillows on her bed as she ignored the world outside her door. She had warded the entire house, needing a break from the eyes that would watch her every move and the whispers when she turned her back.

They were her friends, family almost, but they were also meddlers, and she didn't need that in her life at the moment.

"Dis!" Reggie exclaimed, his fingers wrapped around the chain around her neck. Her hand taking it from his quickly before he pulled the Time-turner from between her breasts. His bottom lip quivered, and she braced for the tears - he was so like his father; wanting what he couldn't have.

Hermione had remained here, although she had considered for an hour of whether to venture back to the place where her love was. It had been Tonks that had interrupted that from happening. Hermione quite liked Tonks, she was humorous, and she brought light to the world that had been dark for too long. She also made Remus happy, something that both Sirius and she had wanted for so long.

She didn't like her at that moment though. When she slowly unpicked her wards and entered her room. Hermione didn't like that she stared around the room and its thick layer of dust; she especially didn't like the pity that fell over her face as she met her eyes.

_"He wouldn't want you to give up living," Tonks had said as she sat beside her on the bed. On his side; the side that she always was on nowadays. "He would want you to... live, and be happy."_

_"Well," Hermione had murmured, "Maybe he should be here to say that himself then."_

It effectively ended the conversation, the door slowly closing behind Tonks as she left to give her exactly what she had wanted - space. For a day or two, no one came by; no one even attempted to. It was... disheartening. Hermione found that she missed them, even if they were all annoying.

Sadness and loneliness manifested into anger, and in a fit of rage she threw up every ward, shield and spell she knew - locking herself in her home, their home. It was horrible, but also freeing. The house was theirs and as she pushed herself to shower each morning, to get dressed and set out a plan for the day she found a groove had come back.

Hermione would read books to Reggie, feed him his favourites and when he went down for his usual nap she would sit there nursing a cup of tea as she stared at the one going cold in front of her. She knew that Sirius would never be here to drink it; she knew that he wouldn't hammer down the stairs at the very smell of it, but she wasn't quite ready to give up making him one - it was second nature.

The chain around her neck became heavier as days passed and when it reached a week, the need for adult interaction was at breaking point, and she held the Time-Turner in her hand contemplating whether to disappear for a fraction of time. No one would miss her, Reggie was asleep - the conditions were perfect.

Her head turned to face the window as an owl stood perched on the windowsill, its beak pecking at the window and while Hermione had never been one to believe in fate - this had to be a sign.

Opening the window, letting the animal fly in and perch on the wooden table in the kitchen. Hermione had shrunk it so that she didn't feel as lonely with a huge dining table and no one sat around it. Her fingers slowly released the letter from the owl's leg, levitating a bowl of food over wandlessly. With the owl content, she peeled the envelope open and saw the familiar writing that made her feel a pang of guilt.

_'Let me in. Remus x'_

Hermione bit back a smile, stroking the back of the owl as she mustered some strength and headed to the fireplace in the hallway, grabbing her wand from the kitchen side as she did. She flicked her wrist as she felt the strength of the wards lessen as she opened the floo. There wasn't even a second gap between her opening it and green flames painting the hallway in emeralds as he stepped through.

"It's nice to see you dressed," Remus commented.

"Nice to see you too," Hermione snarled as she stepped back, leaning against the wall as she looked at him indifferently. She knew that the words needed to be said; she knew that she had to be the one to say it first, but the words - they just wouldn't come.

Remus sighed, biting the inside of his mouth as he placed his hands in his pockets. "You worried me."

 _I worry myself;_ she thought as she took notice of his complexion. The bags under his eyes that matched hers, the sorrow in the eyes that had once sparkled.

"I'm sorry." _For everything,_ she wanted to add. The words, however, didn't come and she just let her head fall and her eyes move to the ground.

Hermione wasn't sure if he expected her to say anything more; she wasn't sure what else to say even if she could. Just as she felt herself fall into her mind, worries and bitterness swirling around her she felt his arms around her, her head meeting his chest and the familiar smell of books and tea meeting her. The smell that had been around her whenever she felt utterly broken by the man who smelt like leather and the earth.

She wanted to resist letting herself be comforted, but she couldn't. Falling deeper into Remus' hold as her shoulders sunk, her heart beat twice as hard and her eyes stung with fresh tears. He didn't hold her like she wanted to be held, not like Sirius would have, but he held her like a friend; like someone who would always be there. Remus was, and always would be, there for her, even if she hated that thought being someone who liked being independent.

"I'm sorry," she whispered into his chest. His hand tightening on her shoulder as she let the sob pass her lips that had been bubbling in her throat since the day she had stormed from him. "I'm so, s-o sorry."

She heard Remus sigh into her hair, her fingers grasping his jumper as she let the pain fill her again, but refused to let it break her. Hermione held on and rooted herself to this moment, not allowing the weight of the chain to twist her and destroy her.

"I'm sorry too," Remus whispered. "I'm sorry you think you're alone." His chin rested on the top of her head, her cries quieted as she listened to him. "I will never leave you, we've been through too much for me to let you fall apart."

Hermione bit her lip as a new wave of tears bubbled, but they didn't sting, they were warm and filled with an emotion she wasn't too sure of.

"Friends for life," Remus said with a chuckle. "Your words, April 1977. If you still want me for life, don't let go, Hermione. Don't let me be alone without you either..." Her eyes closed, letting the tears fall from under her lids as she barely heard the last part between her intake of breath, "you're the only friend I have left."

* * *

**1st November 2003**

Hermione had skidded to the en-suite, the contents of the night before circling the bowl of her toilet. It had been the fourth morning that week, and she was sure this was more than grief that was causing her to be so ill. She grasped the cold porcelain, unwilling to let go incase she stood to quickly, and she'd see more of her stomach before her. It had become tedious especially when she had never been a particularly ill person.

She rose to her feet, staring into the brown eyes that met hers in the mirror. Her hair was wild, and memories of the night before coming back to her. The sound of flesh on flesh, the groans that came from the man in her bed and as she brushed her hair from her shoulder she saw the pink marks that he had left, owning and claiming her. While Hermione wasn't usually one for love bites, she found these ones quite fetching.

Her legs were still sore as she washed her hands, padding back over to the bed that was close to wrecked from their grief-stricken antics. It gets easier, that is what people would always say about grief - yesterday never did, no matter how many years had passed.

As Hermione climbed into bed, Sirius' eyes opened, and his hand found her thigh giving it a gentle squeeze as he groaned at the early morning. She suspected his head was rather fragile, knowing how much he had drunk in the attempt of soothing the anger he had felt.

"Again?" He mumbled half-asleep. Hermione cocked her brow up as he sighed before continuing, "You. Being sick; it's the fourth time this week."

"You keep count?"

Sirius shuffled against the sheets, her eyes watching the muscles on his back contort as he grunted into the pillow under his face. "You're my wife. I do feel somewhat obligated to care."

Hermione shuffled down into the sheets, taking his hand in hers as she placed it on her bare hip as his left eye looked at her from the pillow. "Well, obligation or not you are correct."

"Should get it checked out, love." Sirius rolled over, a rapid movement for someone who had just growled in their pillow, retrieving his wand as he pointed it at her. "Or, I can humour my idea?"

Hermione fakely put her hands up as if she was scared, "Don't hurt me, Mr Black. Please."

Sirius smirked as he brushed his hair from his face, his hand rubbing his beard as he looked deep in thought for a moment before smiling. "Ready?" Looking at him suspiciously she lowered her arms. "It won't hurt a bit."

"Wait," Hermione interjected, but he had already swished and muttered something illegible to her ears. The end of the wand lit a bright yellow, and her torso felt warm all of a sudden.

Her eyes looked down, fear spreading through her as her stomach continued to glow and realisation began to filter into what spell it was that he had performed. When her stomach glowed brighter before shifting blue, she swallowed loudly and lifted her head to meet his to find him sat bolt up with a grin on his face.

"Woah," he muttered. "I owe Moony five galleons."

Hermione's lips parted, her eyes narrowing, "You bet that I would get infected with your child?"

Sirius swung his legs from the bed and stood before she had a chance to swat him, his long legs on full display and his buttocks tensing as he bent to retrieve his boxers - her nail marks looking painful on his back.

"Infected makes you sound as though you don't wish to have a child with me," Sirius sniggered, putting one leg in his boxers as he looked over his shoulder, "And I only bet Remus that I wasn't infertile."

"Wait... " Hermione said standing herself, moving around the bed closer to him as he stood dressed in his boxers. "You - you want a baby with me?"

He looked at her astounded, moving closer as he wrapped his arm around her waist, "Hermione I married you. I chased you for years even when you turned your know-it-all nose up at me, and I fought in two wars to be here for this exact moment. I want a Quidditch team of children with you." She tried to take a deep breath, her hand magically finding her stomach as she rubbed the place she imagined their child was currently residing. "Do you want a baby with me?"

Hermione nodded, words not seeming to appear as she threw her arms around his neck. She chose to blame the next thing on her hormones, just as she would do for the next eight or so months.

* * *

**xox**


	10. It's a Mourning Evening

**Beta/Alpha/Just all the Love** : A massive, huge thank you goes to _SlytherinPrincessNurse1992_ for being the best cheerleader I could ask for.

This chapter is dedicated to my gorgeous beta above, this chapter was a difficult one to write and is a special tribute to her, I adore you, honey.

* * *

**AN** : FYI, chapter updates won't return until 16th of June. I am about to go on a late honeymoon (we got married in November 2015), and while I am fortunate to have someone so supportive of my writing, I feel I owe him my full attention. I love you all and thank every single reader who has come to this point with me. I will see you with a chapter in June.

* * *

**Chapter Ten**

**It's a Mourning _Evening_**

* * *

Who will be there to take my place  
When I'm gone, you'll need love  
To light the shadows on your face

\- - **The Calling** , Wherever You Will Go

* * *

**December** **2002**

"That - _THAT_ is what all the fuss is about?"

Hermione smiled as Sirius' finger traced down the bind of the book before travelling up over to her hand, crawling up her forearm as his lips found her neck. His eyes hadn't moved from her till the last minute, and he was creating a fire deep within her that had spread between her thighs. His other hand had her firmly pinned against him, not that she had even considered moving from him.

"It's a First Edition," Hermione responded calmly, not wanting to let him know the effect he was having on her.

"Oh. _Well do forgive me_ ," Sirius whispered, his tone laced with sarcasm. She felt his teeth nipping before he took a step back and brushed his hair over the back of his head, two pieces falling at the side of his face and it was making her lust for him even more than before. "You dragged me from _our pit of love_ , for a book. A book, Hermione?"

Hermione rolled her eyes, turning on the spot to see him glancing at the racks of books with an expression that only spelt trouble, but Merlin he was gorgeous. All relaxed, dressed in a leather jacket up and a tight t-shirt that had been on her naked body only that morning. Those jeans, left little to the imagination as they hugged his arse like nothing she had known, well except her hands. " _A First Edition_ ," she repeated with a smirk, grey eyes glaring at her as he turned on his heel.

"A book, all the same."

"A _prized_ possession," she corrected.

Sirius put his arms out as he grinned, "Oh but darling, I'm more prized than them all."

"Someone is full of themselves this morning."

Hermione moved out to the till, wishing to remove the frustrated man before he had her up against one of the shelves - although it was a fantasy of hers. She couldn't... wouldn't be playing it out. The shop owner was a long time friend, and so she couldn't... _could she?_

Her teeth bit down on her lower lip as she thought of her fingers running down the muscles in his abdomen when she felt his breath on her neck and fantasy moved to reality.

"If he doesn't come out here in a minute," his hand gripping her hip, "I'm going to desecrate your second favourite place with your moans. How I do that, depends on how much longer you wish to tease me with that lip bite and innocent look."

Hermione looked over her shoulder, feeling her insides turn to jelly at the sultry look he was wearing. "Second _favourite_?"

Sirius grinned as he pressed himself flush against her back, taking her hand to feel the bulge in his jeans. "The first, I assumed, would be our bed."

"You're _incorrigible_."

"I'm sure that's French _for sexy._ Your teasing, so I can only assume that you want me to fuc —"

"– Ah _Miss Granger,_ how nice to see you. Oh, and the husband," the shopkeeper said as she blushed. Hermione snatched her hand from his jeans and heard Sirius growl down her ear, and she bit back a snigger at the sound.

* * *

**June 2005 - Present**

Turning the thought over and over again in her mind - should she go back or should she destroy the only chance at seeing him. An impossible choice, one that was making her lose focus and sleep. The loneliness that was weighing down on her heart had reached a new low and the strength to remain here, in the present, was not nearly the level it needed to be.

Hermione wasn't an idiot. She had once been a bright, capable witch who hadn't needed a man for anything. That part of her had whittled and died when Sirius Black had walked into her arms after twelve years apart. It had reawakened a part of her that had died, making her need and desperation for him stronger than before - it was what made her co-dependent on him.

It was what made her fight.

She wasn't sure she could do it again. Be alone that is; although truthfully she had never been more alone than she was right now.

"Hermione?" Remus nudged her as she turned to see him lighting the candles, a proud smile on his face. "You ready?"

She surprised herself at how good she had become at faking emotions. Her first practice at it had been the night of Halloween so many moons ago; then the night she realised that her bed would be cold and Azkaban had gained a new soul. The third time, she thought proudly, was the charm. Her lips rose into a smirk as she pushed her eyes to twinkle in the way a mother should.

"You sure you can handle it?" Hermione teased, adding extra vibrancy into her voice.

Remus smirked, "I think I can contain my love of chocolate for the birthday boy to blow the candles out. _At least."_

Hermione chuckled, turning around to see the turquoise-haired boy who was already joyous from the festivities. The thought that time had flown so fast as it only seemed like a moment ago that she was holding Tonks' hand as she birthed her son. _Would the same happen with Reg?_ _Would one minute he be blowing out his first candle and the next asking why his father wasn't around?_ She could handle more than most, but that seemed like a life she wasn't ready for.

Her mind switched to auto-pilot as she felt herself follow Remus, the birthday song coming out past her lips and filling the air with sullied cheer. Her hands took her child as she bounced him just as he liked, but each movement she made wasn't her own - she wasn't even here.

The Hermione all of these people loved, hadn't been around for months. The woman here, right in their present, was an imposter - an imposter she created herself.

Her lips pursed as she helped Reg blow out the candles, his hands clapping in joy as everyone cheered and the little one buried his head into her chest. She almost heard the thud of his head meeting her hollow chest, and she wondered if anyone else had. If anyone even cared to notice that she had wilted inside, that her blood had stopped flowing when Sirius's heart had stopped beating.

"Picture?" Harry beams, his green eyes spraying her in emeralds that she wished would illuminate her.

"Sure," she said because _that_ is what is expected of her. Hermione smiles, the flash from the Muggle camera in his hands and it snaps her out of the present.

It reminds her of Sirius. Of their bed. The laughter. Polaroids

" _I've had an entire lifetime of misery, but never with you." He clicked something, a powerful flash filling the room as he smirked. "I have never had a single moment with you that wasn't utterly beautiful."_

A hand clasped onto her shoulder, Hermione's eyes blinking back the tears and as her eyes focused on the room - on the guests who were watching her restless silence - she was sure she saw him. Sweet, smiling, _filthy_ Sirius. The Sirius who wouldn't change out of his greased shirt even if the Minister for Magic came round for tea.

Her eyes twinkled at him, literally shone. And as she smiled, watching him smile back just as she was - she blinked. The hate that grew in her when she opened her eyes to see him not stood there and only worried looks on faces she didn't care for. She furiously blinked again and again, but each time he didn't appear, and she wished she was mad - she hoped and prayed she was mad because he had been there. _She was sure… wasn't she?_

"Hermione?" Remus' soft voice vibrated through her. A flurry of childhood memories, of old friendships and broken promises pierced through her faked happiness and the look she gave him paled him as if she was the full moon. "Hermione?"

"I - I c-can't," she stammered, handing her son to him as she cupped her mouth and ran. Her feet ran up the stairs, her tears fell like waterfalls to nowhere, and it was then, in that horribly broken moment that she needed him.

Sirius. _Past, present or dead._ She needed him more than she needed air to breathe because one goodbye wasn't enough. _It would never be enough._

Hermione's hand grabbed the gold chain that lay at the top of the drawer, his shirts being a pillow for the delicate piece as she held it up to the light coming from the window. Her finger rotated the middle, watching the black sand turn and shift through the space inside the Time-Turner that would take her to her happiness.

The happy place.

* * *

**Spring 1981 - Travelled Back**

Hermione hadn't known why she had come back here. _Especially to this date_ \- the date that was so close to the one where she would lose him the first time. At this point, any Sirius was something, and so she hesitated as she raised her hand to the door of their flat.

It opened without resist and memories of yelling at him to be more cautious came to mind - but she resisted rehashing old times when she saw him blowing dust out of the candle on the windowsill. Hermione knew she didn't belong here - not at this moment and she knew she should leave - but she closed the door all the same, and he turned to look at her before pulling a lighter out of his back pocket.

Sirius struggled to light the candle as Hermione watched the sadness in his face grow, and she felt she had already lived 'the after' of this moment. Remembering when she had come home to find him drunk out of his mind on the floor and wrestling demons he hadn't needed to face. She had tried to drag him to bed, his mumbled whispers of apologies that made no sense.

They made a little more sense now. Now that she knew the 'other Hermione' he had been referring to was her and not as she wrongly assumed the angry version of her that had stormed off to Lily's.

Sirius looked at her with a mixture of comfort and confusion. "You're the _Older Hermione_."

"I'm offended you're classing me by age, _Black_ ," she responded, and the tease rolled off her tongue as easily as she breathed. "Lighting candles?"

"We lost more today. Raid's seem to be going from bad to worse. The whole thing - the whole fuckin' war is getting worse," he sighed. Sirius finished lighting the three-wicked candle she remembered buying - _much to his teasing_.

Sirius turned, his eyes sunk with sadness, "I know it's silly and lighting a bloody candle does nothing -"

"- It's _lovely_ ," Hermione said as she moved across the room fluidly to hold him, "Who?" She asked as though she didn't know. She was struggling to remain composed, allowing him this moment and not taking the words from his mouth.

His head fitted into the crook of her shoulder and neck, just where it always had done - _where it should have always been_. "Marlene and Lateesha. They were so... _young_ , had so much li-life in them-m."

Her hand moved through his hair, feeling each strand as though they were all important. "You couldn't have done anything; _this isn't on you,_ " Hermione whispered into his ear. They were the words she would say later when he was intoxicated, but maybe now they'd mean something.

They were the words she would say later when he was intoxicated, but maybe now they'd mean something.

She brought his eyes to meet hers, "You can't save everyone. You have done so, _so_ much Sirius. Not everyone can survive."

He looked set to burst apart. Hermione knew that feeling; she had seen that very same look in the mirror when she got up each morning in her own time.

"I can't lose anyone else," Sirius sobbed, the walls crashing down and any hint of his usual humour had vanished from sight. This moment was so close to the one where this version of herself would end up alone. "I can't-t, I can't."

She took hold of his chin and guided him to look at her, pushing her own brokenness to the side in the hope of fixing the man in her arms. "You are so strong all the damn time; you aren't weak for having a moment where things are too much."

"You travel-led a-again," Sirius stuttered, her palm moving to press against his cheek. "Did - did you know to c-come he-here?"

"No," she said truthfully. Hermione hated that she had come recklessly and had only intended to sort her own mind out selfishly. It pained her that if this were pre-set if this was all purposefully planned out that she had come here and comforted him, but the younger version of her would struggle in tears later. "I stumbled here, _as usual._ "

Sirius nodded, moving his head back against her and she heard him sniff her jumper. Hermione wondered if he could smell birthday on her, whether happiness had a scent and it would be picked up by the canine in him. She hoped he didn't all the same, not wishing to rub it in his face that he was so sad and she had come from something joyous that she couldn't enjoy.

"I'm glad you s-stumbled here," Sirius mumbled as he pressed a soft kiss to her neck.

Hermione could only fight the tears that wished to spill, "Me too. I love you."

"I love you too."

* * *

**xox**


	11. Fall Together

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Flashbacks to Regulus' birth and Hermione deals with the sadness consuming the Sirius she has gone to see.

**AN:** So sorry for the delay in posting, this trouble was a tad emotional for me to write. A lot of the parts in this are very near to my heart, and so sometimes I struggle to convey them the way I want them to come out - I am probably not making ANY sense, but I've tried four times now to write this note.

**Previously in TTW** \- Hermione travelled back for the second time, finding Sirius in a mess over losing an Order Member.

**Beta/Alpha/Just all the Love** : A massive, huge thank you goes to _SlytherinPrincessNurse1992_ for being the best cheerleader I could ask for.  
Dedicated to the friend who got lost in a sea of unsaid words and unforgettable silences.

* * *

**Chapter Eleven**

**Fall Together**

* * *

Darling you're with me, always around me.  
Only love, only love.  
Darling, I feel you, under my body.  
Only love, only love...

**\- - Only Love,** Ben Howard

* * *

**June 2004**

Nothing about them was conventional. They were the opposites in every way and made sure everyone around them knew it. They were fire and ice, and nothing nice at times; lustful and uncontrollable as they danced like flames around one another measuring up to each other in the face of battle, or mouths meeting in pleasure.

Hermione was perfect for him as though she had been made especially for him; Sirius was all that she needed, and the birth of their son was no different.

Their son announced his arrival mid evening when Hermione had been shouting at him over the lack of chocolate in the house. It had been Moony's fault of course because Sirius couldn't remember the snacking from stress the night prior at the prospect their son would be arriving soon - he didn't feel ready in the slightest.

They had arrived at St Mungo's. Hands clutched around one another and eyes trained only on each other. Hermione had never felt so comforted by him in her entire existence, but the moment was shredded from them when they found out that he was in distress. Sirius wrongly told her that it ' was hardly surprising for how tense she was' - he was banned from the room for several minutes for it.

Sirius paced the marble outside of her room, his shoes squeaking as his nose became repulsed by the clinical smell. His heart was beating louder than ever, his hands sweating and none of it improved when he was called back into the room. One look at her eyes and Sirius knew that there was more wrong that they had first been told.

In the midst of her sweating, her skin blushing brighter than the sun and her screams of agony, Hermione tried to describe a Muggle removal was what the Healers were asking her if they could perform, and the panic beating inside of him went up two octaves. He trusted her, more than he trusted anyone - but trust didn't stop worries, especially his.

"Mr Black is it?" A small witch said, her eyes narrowed at him and her green medical coat drowning her. "I need you to step outside."

Her hand pushing him out of the door, the panic running through him allowed her to guide him out of the room.

"We need a _stress-free zone_ ; no one needs -" The Healers hand circling over him with a scrunched up face, "- _This around._ "

Before he could say much else, he had been yanked back by Remus and forced into acting like a father would.

As little Teddy began grasping for him - just as Sirius knew his son would do one day - and the stern words coming from his Godson he snapped back together, ready to power through and he knew without them would have lost it. He would have allowed himself to miss the birth.

At the sound of her screams, his soul pulled into action. His feet forced themselves into moving towards her, and as the Healer attempted to keep him back once more, her cries for him awoke a part of him that was deeper than love, deeper than souls.

"Sirius... _Sirius_!" Her scream rang out, passing down the corridor of worried friends and hitting his ears like a homing signal.

He looked through the glass beside him, her panicked eyes on him as he turned back to the Healer. He was a father, and already he had never felt so hopeless in his entire life. Hermione was in so much pain, and he was kept from getting to her by what he assumed was prejudice and people with little interest in learning the truth of who he was.

"You let me in that fucking room, or so help me Godric I _will commit a murder_!" Sirius snarled, near spitting in her face in anger. "Nothing, not you, or _anyone_ , will keep me from my son and wife!"

The Healer stepped from his path clearly shaken, and before Hermione was aware Sirius's hand suddenly moved to her forehead, sliding her hair from her face. Her hand finding his as she clutched his tightly, their eyes meeting just as they had when they had entered the hospital.

"I'm so proud of you, so, _so proud of you_ ," he whispered and kissed her forehead. "You're doing amazing."

"Sirius.." Hermione gasped as he held her hand, her forehead scrunched in pain. "I'm scared. And... I'm _never_ scared."

He shook his head as he smiled, brushing her cheek, "Nothing to be scared of love, I'm here for one thing." Crouching down close next to her, making sure that she could see his eyes at all times. "Secondly, between us, there's a very stressed wolf outside who I can unleash out at any time."

Hermione knew he was teasing, but he watched the smile spread up her cheeks all the same. Her nose twitching as took a deep breath, her hand tightening around his as he watched her deal with the pain.

"I remember like it was yesterday the first time I really saw you," he smiled as she laughed weakly, her skin cold to touch as the Healer waved his wand over her.

"The library?" She whispered with a smile, her lips parting as they swirled more magic around her.

His lips pressing against her head as he avoided looking at what the Healers we're currently doing, "No.. It was Hogsmeade sixth year. You got foam on your chin and Moony… Well, he was pathetically trying to tell you about it," she let out a weak laugh as her eyes closed. "You can laugh, but he did a ridiculous job. Anyways, that day I saw you as this brown eyed beauty, and it was so odd that I had seen you, but not quite like that. I knew one day I'd kiss you, because of your eyes..."

"My eyes…" She said somewhat not believing him.

"They're so deep, so beautiful, like they're never ending and I never, not once, seen them disappointed in me. You're the only one who has faith in me, consistently and proudly."

Hermione smirked, breathless as he dabbed sweat from her brow. "You clearly haven't been paying close attention to me all the time," she smiled.

"You always ruin a moment," he whispered with a smile as he moved his fingers in between hers. "From then, every time we sparked in class I was secretly impressed. You always have an answer for everything."

"Sounds like a negative thing —"

"— No love," he smiled to himself. "You're the only witch who puts me in my place. The brightest witch I ever did see."

Sirius looked over as he saw them finally holding him, the little nose, the tiny hands, he had watched so many pregnancy films that he knew this bit by heart. But he hadn't heard it; that deafening scream that should be hurting his ears - it wasn't here.

"Sirius?" Hermione said, he knew that she knew. He knew he had to keep her calm - this was his job, his role and he would be damned if he failed now.

"It's okay, it's okay, he's just —" _I don't know what to say, please breathe son. Please_. "— Thinking about what level to scream at. He has you for a mother after all. Not wanting to set the disappointment level before he can open his eyes," Sirius forced himself to look at her, keeping her eyes on him, "He can't be like his father, can he? The original family disappointment of the year."

Sirius took a swift look over, his eyes beginning to burn with tears that wanted to fall. _Please breathe._ Watching as the Healers rubbed his little chest, he was so early, so unexpected. _Please_.

He felt the tears in his eyes begin to fall, and Hermione was so tired her hand wasn't as tense around his anymore. He hoped it was because she wasn't sad and simply because she was tired because he wasn't sure he could see loss in her eyes. He had seen it once when they lost school friends, and it had haunted him ever since, and more than ever he hoped that they wouldn't lose someone even more important to them. She had lost too much.

_Please_. Sirius thought as a single tear dropped down his cheek. Then the scream erupted from the corner, and Sirius near collapsed beside her head. They both let out a breath of relief, a smile creeping over him as he used his hand that currently wasn't grasping Hermione's to wipe his tears.

"He's okay, he's okay," Sirius soothed as he kissed her head. "You did it; I'm so proud of you, so bloody f-" Her glare made him trail off, and he assaulted her head with more kisses. "I love you."

Hermione looked at him, her brown eyes glistening with joy. "Regulus," she whispered, "After his brave Uncle."

Sirius half wanted to stay true to form and _hiss_ and an _ugh_ , but knowing that even in the darkest times his brother had always been, well, his brother. "Reggie… _For short,_ " he reasoned with a smile.

* * *

**Spring 1981 - Travelled Back**

Hermione stared deep into his soul, and it broke her. Already seeing the crumbling of the hope he had worn every day of the war since their graduation; she could see the darkness creeping in, the doubts and the pain that would eventually tear a friendship apart. She wanted to vanish it, repair it - that surely was the point in all of this, to fix it.

Except it wasn't.

She couldn't change things even if she wanted too. This was all rolling, everything that happens from now is what she set in motion. She couldn't stop a single thing if she tried, she already had apparently at one stage in her life and if she risked a single change now - who knows what future she would go back to.

It was horrid. It was sickening watching Sirius mourn, and Hermione knew she could comfort him, Hermione could tell him how good the future is - but the words never came out of her mouth. She could tell him about their son, give him a chance at making better choices than rushing off to avenge on his own. As her eyes gazed over Sirius who was playing with the rip on his jeans at the knee, she remembered when he got it. Running after her as she tried to escape his clutches dressed in a bow and little else - he had said it was his proudest scar, the one that made him smile. Hermione couldn't even tell him about the many other moments like that they would experience.

None of these feelings were helped by the expression currently residing over his face. The Sirius in front of her looked so defeated, and all of her own feelings seemed so much less important. This Sirius had never ever seemed down, not in her memories at least. She may currently feel sad, and she was so very lonely - but she hadn't lost all that he had up to this point. Hermione had Remus, who she had pushed away; she had Harry, who she had run out on.

His whole world was crumbling, and he was keeping it to himself. She had only stumbled upon this by accident - an accident she apparently made on purpose to follow through with time. Sirius was more than defeated, he was already gone.

The man who would run through the streets after his former friend, wand drawn ready to kill - he was already here, facing her. This man was broken beyond any repair that her time-travel or the Hermione of this era could fix. Fate had been cruel to them both, and she wasn't sure why it had allowed her to see this and not let her fix it. Time was laughing at her, and the thought hardened her insides. To top it all off, the world had taken more from him than she ever acknowledged until now.

Hermione had their son at least, and at this thought she choked back a sob, remembering his beautiful eyes and how she had walked away from him again.

Sirius had lost people who fought beside him; he was losing Remus to the wolves and distrust. He would lose his brother James, and he would be sent away for a crime he hadn't had the chance to commit. He didn't know any of this of course, but it looked like it had already happened in the way his body language currently was.

"I don't know how many times we've been through this," Sirius spoke. His voice a beacon back to this moment, a force that held all her emotions firmly in place. "And if I'm honest, I don't wanna hear another lecture about it." Hermione frowned as he moved his hand from his knee to brush his hair back, her body rising onto her knees as she found herself shuffling towards him. "Does it get better? Does… Do we win?"

She heard it crunch, her heart. She felt it break apart like an iceberg and descend into the watery depths of her soul, engulfed like it hadn't been beating a moment ago.

"Sirius –"

"I know, I know," he growled under his breath, his fingers tugging at the end of his hair, "I just had to ask, y'know? I had to try, I had… I had to do something."

She rolled her lips, finding her fingers brush against his stubble as she pulled his eyes to hers. "Can we forget the world for a moment, yeah? Just, us, here; now. Let's… _fuck it all_ for a breath, yeah?"

Sirius smirked, his eyes widening and she remembered how little she use to curse; how little she still did.

"You came back for a moment with me? Wait till I tell future Sirius, he'll be pissed," he commented, his eyebrows wiggling. "You swear a lot more than you do now."

Hermione bit down on her lip, but this time it wasn't in sorrow, it was in laughter. "Never change Sirius."

He had frowned before it moved into a bright smile, one that was worthy of his name, "I'm perfection, why would I change?" His hand reached behind, her fingers continuing to massage the side of his neck as he threw a cushion down behind her. "Lie down."

"Huh?"

He took her shoulders in his hands, raising his brow in his seriously-Sirius way and smiled. "Lie back with me, just… not even in that way. In an entirely platonic moment, breathe, lie down?"

Deep within those watery depths, she felt her heart beat. It was below, far deeper than it should be, but it was there thumping away; pounding for him, needing him, loving him endlessly. She let him guide her back, falling down to the ground in the slowest motion that allowed her to take in his lack of scars and his fresh tattoos that weren't yet buried beneath others. It allowed her that breath, that second to appreciate how happy they were and how he had always been happy.

It healed her; that part of her that she had surrendered to death was still so alive, she just hadn't believed it.

"I love you," Hermione whispered, "I want to fall in love with you again, all over again. I would, you know? I'd… I would do it all again," _Even losing you,_ she said with her silence, "If it meant those happy years, I'd do it all."

The sad part; the part that almost made her choke and flooded her body with pain was that it was true. Her mind suddenly smiling at her as things slipped into a clarity she hadn't seen, that seeing him, was their life. Her coming back, her visiting him even with the one she lost was life giving her another chance.

Hermione was always going to be here, even when he needed her, not just when she needed him.

Sirius leant over her, pressing a soft kiss to her nose, "I never imagined I'd find someone like you, never mind one that appears in various ages," a laugh falling from her lips, "Thank you, for coming back for me."

She nodded awkwardly on the cushion, "I'd do it all over again," she managed to choke out.

"I'd _do_ _you_ all over again."

A loud slap on his chest sounded out over the flat, their laughter not far behind and for that moment, for that _breath_ , Hermione didn't feel quite as broken. She tried to not smirk at the irony that her heart was healing over losing Sirius, by hanging out with a different Sirius - the irony almost healed another part of her.

_Almost_.

* * *

**xox**


	12. It's A Good Goodbye

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hermione comes to peace with herself, and her mourning.

**AN:** I'm not even sure what to say. I began this as someone dealing with a lot, and this piece became my therapy. We are coming to a close, and with one/two chapters left plus the final epilogue/scene, I am so thankful that you came on this journey with me. I'm not sure how I can explain what this means to me, but it means a lot. Without further emotions, here is the next chapter.

 **Beta/Alpha/Just all the Love** : A massive, huge thank you goes to _SlytherinPrincessNurse1992_ for being the best cheerleader I could ask for.  
Dedicated to the friend who got lost in a sea of unsaid words and unforgettable silences

* * *

**Chapter Twelve**

**It's a Good Goodbye**

* * *

_If you're gonna let me down, let me down gently_  
_Don't pretend that you don't want me_  
_Our love ain't water under the bridge_

\- **Adele,** Water Under The Bridge

* * *

**Spring 1981 - Travelled Back**

The moment was so fragile, she knew it would only be a moment before it would shatter. It was like glass had cracked, all it needed was a breeze for the pieces to crumble and leave the frame empty.

Hermione turned her head, meeting the silver overcast eyes that were upon her. The look, it made her lose her breath; his smile, it made her heart swell to near explosion. It was the look of love, and it wasn't hers to have.

"You're thinking," he smiled. His hand reaching over to brush a strand from her cheek. "Your cogs, turning in your head," his finger moving up to her forehead, "Steam almost coming out of your –"

Her hand swatted him away as his booming laugh filled the flat. Sirius lay back on the ground, his eyes clenched shut as he let the moment fill him as his laugh continued to swirl around them. Even if the sides of her mouth were curling into a smile, she couldn't let the laugh fill her the same way.

It was time, she knew it.

The time to say _another_ goodbye.

It didn't fill her with the same hatred it had before. Somehow, coming back and being a comfort to him, had healed the cracked parts of her. It was like they both picked up pieces and pressed them into their respective places, fixing what had been broken by loss.

He mourned for losses she had already accepted; she mourned for him, not knowing when she'd ever be able to accept it.

"Sirius," Hermione whimpered and his head turned, "I have to go."

For a moment; for a single breath, neither spoke. No one moved and not a sound could be heard - almost as though time had frozen. She swept her eyes over him, taking one last look at him in the flesh knowing that her time needed her. That his time needed him to be alone, for at least an hour before the version of her from this time came home.

Hermione considered that the reason she had stumbled upon him in 1979 drunk off his face, was caused by her appearance. Maybe whatever was about to happen caused him to grab the neck of the bottle and drown his sorrow. It would be okay though, she knew it would be tough for the younger version to deal with, but they'd come out the other side stronger.

"Hermione," he whispered, her eyes meeting his and his image blurring. "I'm sorry, for whatever I did." His thumb wiping the tears that had been falling without her even knowing it and her mouth went dry as if it was filled with sand because she wanted to say that he had done nothing to be sorry for. "I'm sorry for making you come back."

Swallowing as much as she could, a rough sound appearing where words should have been.

"You know I love you, that I would never intentionally want to hurt you?" Sirius continued and she wasn't sure she'd be able to compose herself any longer.

It was the words she had wanted to say to him; that she was sorry for not going herself to the shop. That she shouldn't have asked him to stop carrying his wand. She should have said more when she had the chance.

"I hate it when you cry," Sirius mumbled, sitting up and pulling her up to face him. His large, soft hands on her cheeks. His fingers wiping tears before they had a chance to make their path to her chest.

She loved his hands, but they weren't the hands she knew anymore. The calloused, rough hands of someone who had been through prison, two wars and a marriage - those were the hands she loved.

Her throat feeling like it was going to burst with the fire of the words she was bottling, the burning in her chest from the pain she had carried around every day, getting heavier and heavier was all set to explode all over him.

Hermione wasn't sure what to do, what was expected of her - or if anything was expected at all.

So she spoke from the heart, because the heart can't lie. "I love you, so much," she managed to stutter and she watched his eyes fill with tears that mirrored hers. "It's me that should be sorry." _Because... I was too late and I'm sorry._  
  
Sirius licked his lips, erasing the tear that had been clinging on for dear life. "Go home, baby. Go home and grab that idiot of myself and tell him that, if I know him well enough... He'll forgive you."

Hermione couldn't help but smile. Even then she hadn't noticed how sweet he could be, having thought it was something that came from them being apart. It had always been there it seemed. Taking a deep breath as she clutched his hand on her face, a smirk appearing alongside her bitter tears, nodding just so gently as he stroked her cheek in the way he always did. "Do you forgive me?"

"I'd always forgive you, I love you. I've loved you since the day you got Butterbeer on your face in sixth year," he grinned and she let out a laugh that sounded foreign to her, a laugh that she hadn't heard since that morning when her Sirius had gone. "I'd love you forever, no matter what."

"You promise?" Her voice sounding ever so childlike.

Sirius brought her close, his arms enclosing her and she wanted nothing more than to remain there forever. "One day I'll marry you, and you won't ever have to ask that."

Her composure, which had only been working by a slim chance, broke and a tidal of tears escaped. If she could see herself, she knew it would be an ugly cry, but it was the exact cry she needed.

The one where her tears would mend her soul; where she would bathe in a new beginning, even if that was without him.

* * *

**June 2005 - Present**

When her feet graced the floor of her bedroom, the faint voice belonging to Remus could be heard from the other side. Her hands came up to her face, cupping her mouth as tears she thought had dried began to reappear.

These, however, were not from upsetness, but sweetness. The goodbye, the real and final goodbye, had taken far more from Hermione than she wanted to admit, but it was necessary. Her arms wrapped around the man she had never wanted to let go but did anyway. This time, in his time, it had been on her terms and somehow coming back here didn't feel so full of sorrow.

Her eyes gazed over the walls that had memories clinging to them, and she looked at them with a bitter smile rather than gasping breath as she tried to stifle her mourning. The conversation Sirius had shared with her as she clutched the Time-Turner in her palm, had been the one that she needed more than air and would keep closer to herself more than she would her own secrets.

"Hermione, I know that..." Remus could be heard, the sound of his fingers running up and down the wood. "You're sad; I get it. I'm sad, not in the same... Fuck, I'm fucking this up again, and Tonks did warn me, but... Fuck. Hermione, I love you like my sister-in-law; I love you because we are family - family looks after family."

Hermione perched on the edge of the bed, her eyes watching the door not sure what she was expecting to happen, but she waited all the same. Her hands lowered from her mouth, one to her neck as she stroked her skin; the other moving to the bedsheets on Sirius' side as she did the same strokes to them, as though she was comforting him from here.

Words seemed to come easier to her now that she was here. Simple things like, _stay strong_ , _don't drive your motorbike at night_ \- because she knew the Hermione of that time would appreciate it. They were all warnings she could give that didn't impact on the future they had now, or did have.

They were warnings that didn't break the status quo, and they wouldn't have broken her to say.

"Hermione," Remus' voice cut through her again. The desperation and sorrow in his voice, it hurt her more than her grief had done. For the first time, in the longest time, another voice that wasn't Sirius' rooted her. It made her want to call out to him, to answer and soothe him. "I'm sorry," Remus continued, his voice trailing off as though he was overcome with it all, "I'm so, so sorry."

She flew to the door, her hand shaking as she pulled the wards that kept him out and the door opened, reuniting them. It was like the time in her old kitchen, them two broken and lost finding one another in the mess of mourning. This time, it was she who comforted him.

Hermione's hand moved along Remus' back, and the once strong man broke apart in her arms. Her guilt climbed to a new high realising what her selfish sorrow had done to him, that his words had so much more depth to them than _she's the only friend_ he has left.

"Remus," she whispered as the man sobbed. "Remus, it's okay… it's… one day it will be okay. One day we won't even have to be sad." Her eyes pricking with new tears at the twist of Sirius' words. "One day, we'll smile when we remember him."

"Where - where did you go?"

Hermione froze, her body going rigid as she began to feel in the spotlight - _did he know?_ _He couldn't know?_ "What - what do you mean?"

Remus sniffed loudly, his head lifting up from her shoulder and the tiny things like the bags under his eyes and the new scars on his cheek stood out. "You went in there all - all sad, and came out… together."

She bit the inside of her mouth, because truthfully that was what happened. She, stupidly, went into her bedroom and wanted to trash everything that smelt or reminded her of him - and instead went to him.

Hermione went to him, and he healed her. Just like Sirius had always done.

"I don't know," Hermione lied, finding the truth something she wanted to keep to herself. "But, it doesn't seem as hard right now - but I know that it won't always feel like this."

_One day I'll marry you, and you won't even need to ask._

Hermione's eyes caught the ring on her finger, smiling because even in the past he had known there would be a time she needed that. He married her, so she didn't have to doubt them, him or any of what they shared. Sirius married her because he loved her more than he loved his own life; it was all better with her. That's what he had said, what her head had been reminding her of but she was too stubborn to listen.

"One day," she mumbled and Remus frowned. "Nothing," she smiled, "I think I fancy cake."

His eyes widened, and even she was surprised at her sudden hunger. The change in feeling about celebrating, especially when to him only a moment ago it had all been too much.

Right now, at this exact moment, she was okay. Right now, with the cards on the table and a man who she loved like a friend needed her, she was okay. Hermione needed to be okay. Not for them, or for her son, but for her. She needed to be stronger; she needed to be the woman that she grew into as she fought through wars, and fought for love. If she let that go, she was letting the woman that Sirius chose to marry down - and that didn't sit well with her.

Hermione took in the largest breath, banishing tears that may have wanted to appear and she faced a new thought. Today, it didn't hurt as much as it did before.

That was all she could hope for; that was all she was going to cling on to.

* * *

**xox**


	13. He's The Rain

**AN** : Thank you to all those who have stuck with this, even when I broke your heart, and loved and supported me. You will never know how much I love you all. So much of me is in this piece, and it is the bitterest of goodbye's to this work.

So, without further ado - the final chapter and epilogue.

 **All The Love** to SlytherinPrincess1994 - without her, this would be in my drafts; without her, I wouldn't have gained a friend that I love.

* * *

  **Chapter Thirteen**

** He's the rain. **

* * *

 

 _Tell me what you want to hear  
_ _Something that will light those ears  
_ _Sick of all the insincere  
_ _I'm gonna give all my secrets away_  
 **One Republic,** Secrets

* * *

 

**October 2005**

Things eased.

It started by just a fraction, and then by a lot more than that. A routine began, Hermione and Reggie would get up together, ready to face the day. Remus would pop around on Tuesday's and Thursday's, and they, with Tonks and Teddy, would go to the park.

It seemed nice; normal almost. It felt like nothing bad had happened and moments ago her heart hadn't been in shattered. Hermione didn't feel like her chest was going to shatter into a thousand pieces, and people didn't look at her with so much pity.

For a small period, things _eased_.

It was in those brief moments where her body went cold that she felt she would fall apart. It would be the laugh coming from her son that made her want to dash to her bedroom and just clutch the chain that would take her to see her husband - but she didn't. As much as it hurt to continue, she knew going back wouldn't help either of them, especially when he was nearing the time he would be sat in Azkaban - missing her, wanting her.

Things would fall apart, and she start again putting them back together. She'd have a terrible day, and then for a while things would go well. The next day she would find herself swallowed by a pit of darkness that would leave her unable to think, never mind function. The walls would come in, and memories would haunt her even when she tried to run. Things that relaxed her abruptly pained her, and at one stage she became frightened of lying in bed alone - something she hadn't experienced even as a child.

It was continuous, and Hermione wondered when it would ease.

In his own way, Sirius was there; in either the eyes of their son or the friend he left behind. Remus would come, lie beside her and just hold her hand as he had done when Sirius had left the first time. There would be nothing romantic about it, strictly platonic and she'd let him hold her - because someone holding her was better than no one.

Her tears would cling to her lashes, too afraid to fall and accept the grief again - but Remus would always wipe them, whispering that it was okay and that it was better out than in.

Then, as though nothing had hurt her, she would wake and find the weight gone, and confusion would swirl around her, unsure how today seemed better than the day before. Hermione would plough on regardless, not ever wishing to question anything out of fear it would return.

Her birthday was odd. Her eyes opening that morning, half expecting to see him sat at the foot of her bed wearing nothing but a grin - just as he had done every birthday since they had reunited. Her eyes scanned the space he usually sat, her throat closing as she fought hard against crying on her birthday. Hermione's friends, newly gained family came around her and while she thanked them for not making a fuss, she rather enjoyed the strawberry cheesecake that Harry had brought for her.

_"I didn't think a cake seemed appropriate, but everyone loves cheesecake," Harry had smiled._

She wrapped her arms around him, whispering a thousand thank you's and holding his cheeks as she stared into his eyes - into Lily's eyes; holding onto the James she had known, and the heart that reminded her so much of Sirius.

He was the best of all of them, and she loved him, like a second son.

The day breezed past her, and before she knew it the weather was turning colder and her son was clambering around. There had been odd occasions where she wanted to go and find Sirius in whatever after-life he had ended up in, and throttle him for leaving her with a Marauder child. Reggie was naughty, mischievous and she was sure he was a pathological liar - just like his father.

Hermione pressed her back against Reggie's bedroom door as she silently sobbed one night; unsure how she could continue on her own - how she was even good enough to be a mother. The darkness she had confined to corners was attempting to crawl out and take her, and she'd sit in her bedroom, her fingers stroking photos of Sirius as she tried to fight dark with light; fight loneliness with memories, and it seemed to work.

Then it would be another day with the horror child and she'd question her ability all over again.

The one thing that she found so odd was how missing him seemed easy to think of. She could accept it, in a small way and it didn't shred her to pieces to think of it. Hermione didn't question it out loud and she didn't speak on her worries that all of her grief, darkness and sadness would come back - she just added it to the other baggage she carried around with her and ploughed on with a smile on her face. The cycle endlessly continuing and each time she found herself wallowing, she confined herself in her bedroom until it stung a little less than it had done before.

Grief it seemed, was a battle she couldn't win with sheer strength. As ironic as it was, time seemed the best healer - that was what the books all said; the many, billion books both Muggle and wizard that advised on grief, mourning and depression.

Each page she turned; each paragraph she hoped would give her the answer - none of it held the secret. Hermione continued, purging pages and books; stripping shops and bookcases free with the expectation of something that could help her carry the burden.

So she tried the one thing that she had thought was ridiculous; absurd.

Hermione landed on the gravel, the silence of this place making her clutch her coat a little tighter around her bones. Her fingers twirled the black rose in her fingers as her eyes focused on her destination. With each step, the sound of Harry's words in her ears got louder, as though he was calling for her himself.

" _When... When I went to the forest, I... I saw them, my parents," Harry said with crystallising green eyes, "Talking to them, just... speaking to them, helped. You know?"_

She had nothing left to lose, and as she approached the stone that her nails had once carved into; her fingers wrenching for him to come back. The memory running over her, making her skin crawl and goosebumps appear all over her. While the desire for him to return was still as strong, it didn't break her - not as it had then. ' _That_ _was_ _at_ _least_ _something_ ', she mused to herself as she lowered down onto her knees in front of him - in front of his grave.

Hermione pursed her lips together, her eyes taking each letter carved into the stone, and her focus mainly on her breathing. Words being spoken out loud - they couldn't be stronger than her thoughts, _surely_? Her conscious screaming at her to stop being a fool, and of course, they were.

It was then she noticed that the reason this was hard; that this all felt near impossible, was because even months after him leaving - she _just wasn't ready_.

Sitting here, knees in the grass at his feet, she wasn't ready to say goodbye to him for real. Hermione wasn't willing to acknowledge that he wasn't coming back, and that while she could fly through the past to see him - the version of him she loved more than her own life, wasn't coming back.

The idea should have hurt more. The fact she knew this was a testament to how far she had come, and while she had tried to banish Harry's advice to the back of her head, it seemed the only logical one that would ease her and let her sleep.

"Hi," Hermione whispered. Her voice dry, crisp and nothing like her own. She cleared her throat, taking in a large breath as though it would fill her with confidence. "I'm sorry."

Her fingers lowered the rose down onto the grass before him, and she was sure she heard him scoff from wherever he was.

"I'm not sure why I'm sorry because... the word in this situation is, odd? I just, I don't know what to say," a soft laugh came from her lips, her hand cupping her mouth to hide it because laughing at a grave seemed rude, insensitive even. "Okay now I have something to apologise for," she smiled to herself, "I only laugh because, well, I've never had nothing to say - especially to you! Yet, here I am, completely baffled although I'm so scared and so confused. Why, even when you're dead, do you have to confuse me?"

The hand that had let the rose go was stroking the grass as though he was there, and she was stroking him. Whether that be his bare skin, the cotton shirt, or the leather that her cheek often was pressed against.

"Reggie can walk," Hermione said, the sentence coming from somewhere she hadn't expected. "He's... He reminds me of you, in a good and bad way," the side of her mouth curling as she blushed, "He's going to break hearts, I can feel it already. I'm going to have bloody witches banging on my door as I had with you at Hogwarts. I can't hex him though; I think they call it child abuse now."

The tip of her tongue swept over her lips, feeling the cracks of her dehydration - her concerns that caffeine could dizzy her thoughts and she had been too sick to drink anything else.

"You should have told me," she said, her tone full of hurt. The hurt that sat on her chest all the time, bubbling whenever she thought to intensely about him knowing she would go back. "You - I was always going to go, but, you could have left me a hint, you know? Something that made me not feel so... _guilty_."

Hermione slid from sitting on her knees to her side, moving her legs around as she sat in front of him cross-legged. Her arm wiping a travelling tear that she hadn't known had fallen.

"This hurts, Sirius. I just want you to hold me - like the way _you_ _did_... like the way I took for granted, and... I want you to kiss me like you'd never get too, because I want to treasure it. I'm sorry I didn't cherish you, not like I should have, not like I would have..." her voice wilting away as her sobs began to choke her. Her body shook, her bones aching as she finally let it go - finally let it all wash over her. "You left me... You bloody," her head shaking as her hair stuck to her tear soaked cheeks, "You promised me, and - and _you_ _left_ _me_ , here of all places, alone and, and I'm mad at you, and I'm sad and... Sirius it fucking hurts."

Hermione gasped, mid-sob and mid-shock at herself for swearing in such a sacred place. Her teeth biting down on her lip, causing blood to appear and the bitter iron taste filling her mouth, but it didn't hurt - not anymore than this, talking, did.

"Now look at me, swearing in a bloody graveyard," Hermione mumbled, her fingers pulling at the grass she had once been stroking.

I don't want to do this. I don't want too.

That was all that ran through her head. It was like a song on loop; one she couldn't forget the words if she tried. If she hummed along, she was sure she could make it into a song. A song of broken hearts and sadness.

I don't want to be without you.

Hermione looked up, staring at his name, and she took in a deep breath. "Look after me..." she said, barely audible, but she had a feeling he heard. "Just, haunt me a little. God, I sound crazy - but, watch over me, please? So that I'm not entirely alone; so that I'm not without you all the time."

The wind blew past her, and she wanted to take it as a sign, but even she wasn't convinced that if Sirius was here that he'd be the wind. It wasn't dramatic enough; it wasn't Sirius at all. Hermione was about to mention that when the heavens opened above, the rain hammering down on her as her blouse, skirt, and coat clung to her frame.

If this were another situation, she'd have been pissed off. She would have growled and screamed at the universe, but this time, at this moment only - she laughed. She let it roll from her lips as her makeup fell from her face, her head tilting up as the rain pellets hammered against her forehead and cheeks.

Hermione let it wash over her; she let it bathe her. The rain was him telling her that he was here, in true dramatic style. She almost wanted to scream that he could do better than this, but she had learnt before about egging him on - and she didn't fancy being struck by lightning.

She should have got up, danced in the rain; but there was something so peaceful about sitting at his graveside being showered with rain. Her hand in the grass as she imagined his hand there somewhere, her eyes closing as she let the droplets drip down her face, off her jaw to her chest before they made a descent between her breasts to her abdomen.

"I miss you," Hermione mouthed, and the rain lessened around her and her eyes slowly opened as she saw the clouds part before her. "I'll always miss you."

She pushed on the ground aiding her to stand as she towered over the gravestone, her hand wiping the water from her face as she smiled, taking in a large breath.

"I'll be back at your birthday," her shoe running over the grass where she had sat, "I might even bring you a little drink... If you're good," her smile growing at the stupidity of her statement, "I love you. Say hi to James and Lily for me," the wind blowing her hair from her shoulders, "I'll look after Remus."

* * *

  **xXx**


	14. Dad

**AN** : It ends with a smile. I love you all, Pierre xox

* * *

 

**Chapter Fourteen - The Epilogue  
** **Dad.**

* * *

 

 _And there's certain things that I adore  
_ _And there's certain things that I ignore  
_ _But I'm certain that I'm yours_  
 **James Arthur** , Certain

* * *

 

**June 2015**

Hermione clutched the letter that had been owled to her that morning. She had strong suspicions that it was purposefully meant to be sent on the morning of their son's eleventh birthday, and it made all the feelings she thought she had buried, rise. She had tried to piece herself together before her son suspected anything, and before it ruined the mood that she had been attempting to create all week.

She realised that until Hermione told him; until she was honest with him that she would never be able to settle and it would hang over their son-mother day like a bad smell.

"S'up Mum?"

Hermione had called for him before she was ready too, and now he was stood there before her. His grin that reminded her so much of him; the dark raven hair that he couldn't stop playing with, and the leather jacket he had begged his Uncle Remus after seeing a photo of his father on a motorcycle.

She had to smile. It flowed from deep within her and covered her lips before she could even think of an excuse not too. The adrenaline running through her was banishing the anxiousness she had felt when she read the words that had come for her.

"I've got one last present for you," Hermione said, her hand unclenching the letter and the gold chain that had begun to leave marks in her hand. "You cannot, ever! Not even if it was a life and death situation -"

"- Mum, I get it," Reggie said with a cockiness to him that he was born with, intelligence in his eyes she saw in her own - he did; he completely understood. "I won't tell anyone. Which means that it's illegal right?"

Hermione smiled, "Oh so many laws will be broken, but… rules are intended to be broken every now and again."

Reggie's face lit up, a mischief to his cheeks that she had seen on Sirius for most of their time together and the odd time on Remus' when he learnt of what Teddy had been up too. "Who said that?"

"Your dad," Hermione said with a sigh. "He was such a pain in the arse."

* * *

 

**Spring 1979 - Travelled Back**

Hermione stood, her hand on her son's shoulders as the door opened and a much younger Sirius stood before her. His brow raised, taking a second to glance at her as though trying to figure out where he knew her from. He was more intelligent that she ever thought; he noticed things that she often didn't - so she knew that Sirius would catch on.

"Mr Black?" Hermione said with an innocent smile. "Sirius Black?"

Sirius leant against the doorframe, blocking them from glancing at the flat that she had once shared with him. The words in his letter running through her mind:

_Spring 1979. Bring him._

_Before you whittle, I know what happens, and you need to trust me._

_Just lie and tell me he's a kid of one of our school friends, or something of that kind, I get over the lie, but… I know the future, and you don't so just trust me, break a few rules - that's what they're for._

_Love you always._

_S._

"This is Meadowes' son. I know you aren't that close to that family," Hermione said as Reggie turned to look at her, shock, elation and tears building in his eyes. She had felt him stiffen at the sight of his dad, and she could only imagine what was running through the poor boys head. "He just wanted to say hello before he is sent abroad - to - to school," the lie rolling off her tongue easily.

If he thought she was lying, Sirius didn't show it. His eyes had sparkled at the word 'son', and she had a strong suspicion that he had already put two and two together; after all, he had written the note informing her to do this.

His hand outstretched in front of him, her eyes watching as their son just stared for a second - frozen in fear. Hermione rubbed her thumb over his shoulder, attempting to convince him this was okay and eventually Reggie nervously shook it, looking at his father with sheer love, adoration and sorrow.

"Y'alright son?" Sirius asked, and Hermione was sure she heard her son let out a squeak at the sound, causing Sirius to frown deeper than before.

Hermione held Reggie's shoulder a little tighter, hoping it would soothe him somewhat. Him turning to face her, as he tried to hide wiping a tear and the sight made her choke up, wanting to bring him in for the tightest hug.

She silently asked him if he was okay, if this was too much and if he wanted to go. Reggie just offered her a smile, telling her that he didn't want to go anywhere - and she let the moment flood her, letting the warmth from her heart spread to her toes and fingers.

Looking up at Sirius, she cleared her throat. "He's just had a lot going off, war and all that, so he's a bit nervous," she lied, Reggie looking over his shoulder at her, thanking her with his eyes. "He's due to go to school soon, any advice? I heard that you were quite the student."

At this, Sirius lit up like a candle. His cheeks blushed with a colour, and he stared at her eyes, knowing the exact shape of them, shade and look that she must have been expelling. This was it, she thought to herself, this was the time she went back and led him to expect her through his life before he was sent to prison.

The first grief stricken moment she had travelled back too, and he had known she had travelled back - he had known her, without any question.

"Well… What's your name?" Sirius asked, his arms crossing in front of him.

"R - Reggie," their son coughed out, and Sirius smiled, looking from him to her before clearing his throat. The meaning behind it all not being missed, and she felt herself stand a little taller; a little prouder.

"Reggie. My advice to you… Cause as much mischief as possible -"

"- Sirius -" she warned in the exact tone she used especially for him, and he grinned.

Sirius Orion Black bloody grinned; he grinned as though he knew it all, and while this would usually frustrate her, she couldn't help but smile back. She was busted; she had been outed by his own letter and, even from the dead he was still pulling strings to get her blushing; to get her in trouble.

"Calm down, love," Sirius said as smooth as ever. The word love passing his lips and shooting her right in the heart, and she was sure the organ grew double in size.

Sirius moved to stand from his leaning position as he stepped to the side before motioning for them to come in. "I'm just telling the lad what a man has to hear, isn't that right?"

As Hermione guided a nodding Reggie in - the poor boy paralysed in pure shock. She pulled her sleeve up, making sure that she kept an eye on her watch so not to overstay her welcome or affect the timeline in any way.

She happened to be so distracted that when Sirius caught her elbow softly, and the touch ran through her body making her stomach knot in the only way he ever caused, she blushed instantly - losing all of her composure.

"He looks like you," Sirius said with a proud smile, "But he's all me, isn't he?"

Hermione looked into his eyes. Those grey, burning eyes that made her want to abandon all clothes and logic; the eyes she'd die for, that she would love until her last breath.

"He's the best parts of us," she whispered back, and she was sure she saw tears fill in his eyes.

Sirius met her eyes, holding them and a thousand memories swam between them. Old and new; love and anger. Passion and fury; war and healing.

"Perfect. He... You," Sirius rolled his lips, struggling to find words. "I'm quite lucky, aren't I?"

No, she said. Half of her thinking of how it all ended with them, all the pain that they had gone through, but it wasn't any of that which made her think no. It was a no because he wasn't lucky, she was.

Hermione had been lucky to have him, to get the chance to love someone like him. She was even luckier for the boy hovering before them, his eyes shining with tears at the sight of his parents together.

"We, are lucky," she said, for once not arguing, and she was pleased that Sirius simply nodded.

His finger reached out stroking her cheek, his eyes looking at her with the same look he gave her when they married, when he held her hand when Reggie was born - like she was the only thing in the world he could ever love. His touch soothing all of her body, her heart even slowing down to normal and a shuddered breath passing her lips, her body needing him to be closer.

"I love you," he whispered just loud enough for her to hear. In the exact same tone as he had said it for all the years she had known him, his thumb pausing in its motions of her cheek as his eyes burned into her reading her soul.

Just like he had always done.

And she loved it.

* * *

 

**Fin**

**xXx**


End file.
